The pendulum – Summer National Pairs – Session 3
We’ve pushed ourselves into a tight contract. How do we play? ♥ K can take care of the club loser, so we need to limit ♠ + ♦ losers to 3. The big question is who has the ♦ K. If its on the right, we are much better off playing Ace and another diamond. Then if length is with RHO, we’ll be able to neutralize LHO’s trump holding by playing diamond winners through him. One down side of this is that we’ll need to cash ♥ K when we cross to ♦ A for a club discard, and thus will immediately be susceptible to a tap out. Then even if diamonds were 3-3, we may not be able to enjoy them.
Life seemed much simpler comparatively if diamond finesse worked. Now if diamonds were 3-3, or Kx with lho – we could ruff one diamond, duck one spade and simple give up 3 spade tricks.
Not today.. K987 offside. Playing Ace and back will keep us alive.
A 40% score.
We were still in the lead, though the margin had reduced a bit and was now less than one board.
Thank you Sandeep. The hands and the problems faced come alive with your narrations. Thinking of the field and par actions and still getting the rough end. Tough.
Very instructive and enlightening thought processes in the ozone layer of bridge.
Let this be the 1st of many chapters to come in a great book !
All the best.
TJ