Listen to the Bidding

Any expert will tell you that listening to the opponents’ bidding and trying to visualize possible hands they could have that match the bidding is a big part of what makes someone a good declarer. But sometimes it becomes clear that the opponents can’t possibly have all their bids and have to be able to figure out which one of the defenders is more likely to have misbid.

Today’s hand features a hand in the final session of the NABC IMP Pairs where I had a chance to win 11.5 imps but managed to go down in 3♦X and lost 2 imps.
 

Dealer: W Vul: none	North ♠ Qxx ♥ Qxxx ♦ KQJ87 ♣ x
West ♠ Kxx ♥ ATxx ♦ xx ♣ AQxx		East ♠ AJxxx ♥ Kxxx ♦ Tx ♣ Jx
	South ♠ xx ♥ J ♦ A9xx ♣ KT987x

West	North	East	South
1♣	1♦	1♠	3♦
Pass	Pass	X	Pass
Pass	Pass

East led the ♣J and it should be pretty clear that neither defender has a trump stack – at least not a good stack. East’s double is surely takeout showing something like a 10-count with roughly 5-4-1-3 shape and this is close enough. With a more distributional hand, east may not offer west a chance to pass for penalty and bid 3♥ instead.

There are 2 ways to approach the play of this hand – cross-ruff all the way or draw trumps and then take the ruffing finesse in clubs. There are 4 top losers and the defense inconveniently took all 4 winners immediately and then tapped dummy by playing a 3^rd round of spades. I could try to continue to cross-ruff the hand but there is a little danger of being over-ruffed with the 10 at some point or I could draw 2 rounds of trumps and take the ruffing finesse in clubs (which is sure to win). Since trumps must be drawn before taking the ruffing finesse and the ♦A is the only other real entry to dummy unless diamonds split 2-2, I opted for a full cross-ruff. I trumped a club low, ruffed a heart, ruffed a club high, ruffed a heart, ruffed a club high, and ruffed my last heart. At trick 12 I finally had to ruff a club with the 8. Down 1 when simply playing ♦K-A and then clubs would have made the hand easily.

I was too focused on the idea that they wouldn’t be doubling me in 3♦ without one of them having 4 trumps (or at least 3) that I didn’t even consider that for east to be short in diamonds, he would have to have too many major suit cards for double to make any sense. And if west has the diamond shortness, the contract is doomed anyway. So, basically, east’s bidding was definitely consistent with 5-4-2-2 shape and really, with us having 9 trumps including the AKQJ, neither opponent could have a trump stack worthy of leaving 3♦X in.