Improve Your Play #47

IMPROVE YOUR PLAY #47 with Larry Matheny

Matchpoints (pairs) is a very different game. Your goal isn't to just make or defeat a contract, rather you must strive for the largest plus or smallest minus possible. Sometimes you might even risk the contract.

Scoring: Matchpoints

Hand #47
Dlr	N
Vul	E-W

	10543
	864
	J42
	Q87

	J97
	532
	K965
	542

	Q82
	9
	Q873
	AJ1096

	AK6
	AKQJ107
	A10
	K3

West	North	East	South
	Pass	Pass	2
Pass	2	Pass	2
Pass	3*	Pass	3NT
Pass	4	All Pass

* Second Negative

BIDDING: South had a huge hand but his partner showed only 0-4 high card points with his two bids. South had 9+ tricks in his hand so offered 3NT but North sought the safety of a trump suit by bidding 4

.

PLAY: West had no obvious lead so tried to risk nothing by leading a trump. Declarer won this in his hand and noted that dummy's eight of hearts was now an entry. South saw that he only had three losers, one spade, one diamond, and one club, so his task was to find a way to make an overtrick. Although the opponents' spades divide 3-3 only 36% of the time, this seemed his best chance. So he drew one more round of trumps and then played ace, king, and another spade. He was rewarded when the spades behaved and he was able to enter dummy with the heart eight and discard his small diamond on the last spade. He would have gone down in a cold contract if one of the opponent's had a singleton (or void) in spades, but it was a slight risk.

Note that the opponents could not have prevented the overtrick. If West leads a diamond at trick one, declarer wins the ace and later leads the ten to establish the jack for a discard for his losing spade. At rubber bridge or in a team game, declarer would probably just claim ten tricks after the opening lead.

Copyright ©2007 Larry Matheny.