A slam

I was pleased to make this slam. I haven't been playing well lately (too much stress at home). This was the first board of a round, and on the last board of the previous round I put a cold 6NT on the floor. So it showed a certain amount of faith for my partner to give me that final raise to slam.

 

 I mistrust my analysis somewhat these days. I spend far too much time on BridgeWinners, and the exposure to world-class players is a bit intimidating. But my thinking was that I would draw trumps and take a ruffing spade finesse to get rid of the 4th diamond, making 7 if the AS was onside. Once the bad trump break showed up, I decided to ruff spades in my hand, hoping to bring down the AS, at which point I could lead winning spades from the dummy until North decided to ruff in. That plan didn't quite work, since the AS is so well protected. But the actual result was prettier, with North's QH and South's JD both trying to win the last trick.

 Looking over the hand the next day, it was suddenly obvious to me that a far superior line of play was available. After the AH revealed the bad break, I don't need the KH to draw trumps: the J9H in hand are sufficient. So at trick 3, cross to the KC, ruff a diamond, ruff a spade, ruff the last small diamond with the KH. Now ruff a spade and lead the JH. North can't stop you getting back to hand to draw the last trump with the 9H.

 

 So if this is so clear now, why couldn't I see it at the table? There are a couple of factors that spring to mind. First and foremost, there is the fact that I had such a clear plan for the simple case. When the trumps didn't break, the natural tendency was to basically stick with the same plan, just modifying it enough to try and cope with the new circumstances. It is difficult to take a step back and recognize that there might be a completely different possibility. A second factor is speed. I played too quickly, not giving myself enough time to consider different possibilities. That is a bad habit I have to work on. Third is pressure. At the table, you have opponents and a partner watching you, and you are under at least some time pressure. At home, you can relax, sip your coffee, and let your mind roam through the field of ideas. Achieving that state at the table is harder than it sounds.

 All things to remember when the next hand goes pear-shaped.

psych

Well, times have changed, and yet still things stay the same. More or less, anyway. At the moment, my health is good. I finally shook off the last effects of the near-fatal illness that hit back in 2011. But now my wife is not so well, so we still spend too much time worrying about doctors and insurance and money. The Manhattan Bridge Club closed its doors a couple of months back, and we nearly all moved to Honors, including the management team. So Honors now runs close to capacity on weekday afternoons, and has a healthy set of games in the evenings too. Despite feeling a little sense of loss for the MBC name, we are actually better placed for bridge now than we have been for some time. So perhaps I should start blogging again. But I don't have the enthusiasm for it that I had five years ago. So I think I shall content myself with the occasional interesting hand. I'll start with a classic.


 I talk about psychs on a regular basis, but I haven't actually done one like this in a very long time, years I think. There's nothing original going on here, of course. Third in hand with 2 hcp and a partner who will open all 12-counts, I know the enemy has a game at least. I don't like being vulnerable, but we weren't having that great a game, so stirring the pot seemed justified. And opening the 3-card suit is the traditional approach: you are trying to pick off the enemy suit while reducing the risk of partner raising. I don't play Drury with Agent 99, so a raise would be dangerous. Everything worked according to plan. North had a nice hand, but with us bidding her suits, she decided to keep quiet. If I had opened a spade, Agent 99 would certainly have raised to 3S or 4S, but the 1H opening fetched a 1S response. She actually managed to escape for 2 down when South flew up with the AD on a diamond lead from hand. Perfect.