Please play
Dummy – K4, A643, Q8754, K7
Hand – A762, KJ92, AK, 654
Vul vs NV. RHO opened 3C. You somehow manage to reach 4H from wrong hand and LHO leads club 10 through king. RHO cashes 2 clubs (LHO follows to second) and returns a third that LHO ruffs with the heart Q. What next?
1+
The Vulnerability and the punctuation — the period (or possibly the comma) to distinguish between who is Vul — RHO who opened 3C, or the declarer, does not seem relevant on the hand except perhaps by posing a problem of what to respond with the Dummy’s hand after 3C Dbl by partner. Looking at the Kx in Clubs should one bid 4H directly on 4 cards?
In any case, it does not seem safe to discard when LHO ruffs, especially if they are Vul, RHO may now get a ruff. So, for starters, over ruff, play H to 9 and pray that LHO has not snared you.
Now, if he shows out, you need a squeeze on LHO in S and D. This means RHO cannot have 3 Spades, implying that he cannot therefore be void of Diamonds, if you have to make the hand. So, duck a H now. If he gives a ruff sluff, come back with a Diamond, using the logic above, to draw trumps. If he returns a Spade, win the Ace in hand and draw trumps for a criss cross squeeze, with the extended menace in Spades gaining 2 tricks to compensate for the loss of the DQ.
Spot on. The only minor issue to resolve is to figure out which suit has winners. When you play heart to 9, LHO plays spade Q and when you duck a heart, LHO discards spade 3. RHO returns spade 8 on which LHO plays 9 and on the next heart diamond 2 and on last heart spade 10.
Guess work? Table feel? Or some logic to decide which suit has winners set up?
Looking at the Dummy, it will be clear to LHO that he is the only one guarding Diamonds, and that his partner may still be guarding Spades. However, it is also easy to figure out that with Axx Spades (instead of Axxx), the declarer would have ruffed the third Spade on the table. But using this information to figure out that the declarer has a guess in the ending, and to plan a false-carding strategy, is hard.
You can cash the D Ace after drawing trumps just to see LHO’s excitement level, but proceed on the assumption that he is still stopping Diamonds. This should work most of the time, but…
Nice hand!