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“Hidden Treasure”.         

A fairly straightforward bidding sequence with presumably a fairly strong hand which opened the bidding about to go down in dummy. They need a stop in the suit you have overcalled and when their partner says “yes, I have one”, you are on lead to 3NT. Your problems are now about to begin…and could indeed end with your choice of opening lead.

1 promised 3+ clubs. 2 asked for more information, particularly about the spade suit. What would you lead? You are playing Teams.

What seems apparent is that North has either a long strong club suit of their own or else a good fit with their partner’s diamonds, or both. South must have K because if your partner held that card, they would surely double 2 indicating holding it. In some respects, your choice of lead is now determined as to:

• whether you can afford to give declarer a spade trick and hope you or your partner can still regain the lead enabling you to run off some spade tricks,
• or whether you can just sit back and hope your partner gains the lead and can fire through a spade.

 A lot seems to depend on where the J is since if you do not lead a spade and your partner does not hold J, then you will only be taking two spade tricks quickly, maybe not enough to beat the contract.

Decision Time..

So, it’s getting close to decision time. We can eliminate a diamond lead and perhaps a club, too as that might be a long strong suit in dummy. Which major is it therefore to be?

You will know what will happen if you lead a spade. A low heart is more speculative though neither opposition player showed much interest in that suit. It would have been a very good time to lead one of your two small hearts but not for the reason stated above, as your partner had no entry in either minor suit:

 

 

You could not get very rich very quickly in spades but hearts was a different matter. Giving up one spade trick was, because of the even diamond break, just conceding an overtrick.

 After five rounds of hearts, it was a different matter. South had to give up three of their minor suit winners and two minor cards from dummy. It was not a case of 9 or 10 tricks but just 6 for South, -300.

We cannot ask about two suits in such an auction like the one above. We can only ask whether we have a hold in the suit the opponents have bid and not in the other suit. Partner should be there to provide help in that suit. If that unmentioned suit is a major, there seems a particularly good reason to lead if leading your own suit is not an obvious one to lead.

Pairs or Teams?

There is an irony in that playing Pairs, you do not want to give up unnecessary overtricks. Therefore, leading the heart is more appealling in that you will preserve AQ and not give declarer a quick spade trick. That lead saw the contract beaten by three tricks! Meanwhile, a low spade lead might appeal more in the Teams environment but would be very unsuccessful on this occasion.

speculation..on opening lead

Neither North nor South did anything wrong in the bidding. They might have stopped in 2NT to limit the damage though there was a much bigger up-side in being one level higher on the lead of three out of four suits. Yet, the final contract was a very poor one if the unbid major had been led. Let’s hope it was at your table.

       And talking of majors, here you seem to have a choice of playing in one or defending the other. What would you do?

 

You are playing Pairs.

Richard Solomon

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