My partner and I are playing against some new faces at a sectional tournament in the penultimate round. The afternoon has been somewhat torturous. We've had plenty of bad luck and not enough good cards to really do much.
Our best auction of the day brings us to a 6 Hearts contract which I very delicately play. The contract is ice cold, and it sort of feels that way, but I make sure to protect myself against the rare spade break that would allow me to set myself. This careful play (coupled with the long auction) would eventually earn us a few snarky remarks from our opponents at the next table who were impatiently waiting for us.
Two hands later, this same careful play was totally thrown out the window on a hand that looked like my cat could have played it.
I misplayed it and went down.
My cat would have made overtricks.
Here she is:
4th seat, Vul vs Not.
Pass to my partner who opens 1D (which can be as few as two) - pass - 1H by me - pass - 1S - pass to me.
Perverts rebid 5 card suits. I don't care how good my suit is. Change the 3 of hearts to the Jack, and maybe I sympathize with rebidding hearts, but that's a rule I try not to break...EVER.
I bid 2 Clubs - alerted as 4th suit forcing. You can play it as forcing only for one round but I like playing it as forcing to game.
This is one of my favorite conventions - it implies* 5 cards in the first suit I bid. Partner can now bid my suit with 3 card support (and we're still at the 2 level, with plenty of room to investigate) or show a stopper in the artificial suit by bidding NT. If he has neither of these, he can rebid one of his own suits and I won't take him for extra length.
Partner pleases me by bidding 3C which I take as showing length in clubs. He could have bid 3NT, but he now let's me play it, an honor I have waited on for most of the day.
Lefty leads the 5 of diamonds and partner plops his 11 magical points onto the table:
Cool.
I win the Ace of diamonds, play a low club to the King and a low club up to the Ace.
Lefty shows out, pitching a low heart.
Oops!
I've now blocked myself out of dummy and will never get my 5th club.
My hand now holds 108 of clubs opposite Q75.
I guess I can try revoking?
Barring some sort of miracle layout or unlucky defense I settle on the only hope I have left - finding the jack of hearts. Down one probably isn't doing anything for me and it's certainly not gaining me any silver points.
I cash the Queen of clubs, playing the 10 from my hand. Righty disappoints me by playing the Jack. I was sort of hoping Lefty had it hidden behind her diamonds...
I could try for the drop but that seems unlikely with 7 out, so I play the heart and stick in my ten.
Lefty wins her jack and they cash 2 diamonds and 3 spades for down 2.
Top to Zero in under 5 seconds.
Here it be:
I can't remember because I was too busy sobbing to myself, but my guess is that the opponents each pitched a diamond on my 4 clubs.
South does well by pitching one heart, one diamond and one spade. I didn't raise spades so she can assume her partner has something and can 'safely' pitch one. North should pitch a heart or a spade. Maybe he thinks a heart pitch gives the suit away, but it's the lesser of the two evils. Keeping a diamonds would give them 3 diamonds, the jack of hearts and 3 spades for down 3.
I always try to make a plan once dummy is revealed. My plan was to take 5 clubs, 4 hearts and 1 diamond. I can't afford to try for overtricks with only one diamond stopper.
I had counted my 9 tricks but rather than think through the potential pit falls before starting to play, I rushed right in. I remember thinking that a 4-0 club split would give me some trouble, but I can handle anything less.
I didn't care about 3-1 or 2-2 and I didn't think about my transportation at all.
Once everyone follows to the King of clubs I should be thrilled, then stop and make sure I don't mess it up.
I hate going down or misplaying because I played too fast or didn't think things through enough.
Clubs are 2-2 or 3-1 - The Jack is falling by the third club trick and I now have 5 club tricks. I have to unblock myself by playing the 8/10 of clubs to the Ace at tricks 3, then the other on the Q at trick 4. 7 - 6 and then my 5 cashes.
South will be put in a tough spot to discard on my 5th club. She can stiff her Queen of spades, pitch the Queen of diamonds or pitch a 2nd heart. Maybe she pitches a 2nd heart - it's not easy when you only look at the south hand - in which case I cash 5 heart tricks for +660.
That's depressing. At IMPs that's a 13 point swing.
I don't know why I played a low club to the King at trick two. It felt right because I should cash my winners on the shorter side first and I felt like I was in a better position to handle 4 clubs on my left.
But If I decide to play the Ace and take a look, I HAVE to pitch the 8 from my hand. Pitching the 8 or 10 unblocks right away but pitching the 8 allows me to still protect against all 4 clubs on my right. (Jack can be finessed into K10)
The biggest key is that I have to look at my transportation at trick 1. Once the diamond is led, I have one entry to dummy. My 6 of clubs is now a huge card because it is my transportation. That's why it's good sometimes to ruff with the second lowest - just so you can keep transportation between both hands and avoid getting locked in dummy.
Hopefully this is a lesson that I won't have to learn again.
:-D
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