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                                    can be different. 

A Teams and a Pairs top!

What does it take to score a good board at Teams? Bidding a making slam is always a good idea. Yet, playing Pairs, you just have to make more tricks than the rest of the field. The Pairs game is often criticised for none too great bidding. It can be called “the race to 3NT”.

What, initially, would you bid as South here?

 

1 promises at least 3 clubs while 2 is a standard Weak Jump Overcall.

You want to be in game and with a fair heart hold, it looks like you want to be in 3NT and so that is what you bid. Tell them nothing. That can be a good philosophy, too.

Yet, occasionally, you would like to be a little higher. Partner raises your 3NT one level and your heart hold does not look that great. So, you pass the invite. That’s a shame because when you see dummy, you would rather like to be in 6, probably a better contract than 6NT. Blame it on the Pairs format, maybe. Perhaps blame it on your failure to bid a natural 3 over 2. Your partner may well have driven you to the better slam.

Yet, that is irrelevant now. West has led 8 and your aim is as many overtricks as you can get.

 

What is your line?

If West happens to have Q, you could see your way to all 13 tricks though in doing so, you will have to finesse in clubs towards the danger hand and you would not want to find East producing the Q too early.

Often it is good play to duck the opening lead in such a situation though you want all the overtricks you can get. While you will be running your diamond tricks soon, a little piece of prior exploration will do no harm.

So win A and play J to K (some days you may see Q appear). That’s not today. So, next play three rounds of spades, discarding a heart from your hand. On the third round, East discards a low heart.

Now, comes 5 rounds of diamonds. East discards another heart on the third round of that suit. What is East’s shape?

 

That’s right. 6 hearts, 2 spades and 2 diamonds. There were two ways of coming to 12 tricks. After you play 5 rounds of diamonds, discarding a spade and a heart from dummy, these cards remain…and you know what East’s last heart is:

The play of the 9 guarantees 12 tricks where-ever CQ is.

Alternatively, had South ducked the opening heart lead and won the heart continuation, East would be in trouble when the last diamond is played:

Notice that if West had held the Q, they would be squeezed. On the actual deal, East would not enjoy their discard.

So, 12 tricks should be made even with Q protected off-side. In the A Point event from where the board came, no pair made more than 11 tricks including the pair in 6NT.

The key play whether or not the opening lead was ducked was to play off the three top spades before the diamonds. That 9 was a most useful card either as a squeeze threat or an exit card.

6 would have proven relatively easy by ducking the opening heart lead, ruffing the third round of the suit and discarding South’s third club on the third round of spades.

Different ways of getting a very good score, depending on which version of the game one was playing. However, there is nothing wrong with bidding and making a slam in Pairs either!

Richard Solomon

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