A Study in Slamming

by Barry Rigal

Board: 2. Dealer: East. Vul.: NS
	♠ A 9 ♥ 9 4 ♦ Q J 5 4 3 ♣ 8 7 6 3
♠ 10 ♥ 8 7 5 2 ♦ A 10 8 2		♠ K Q J 6 4 ♥ A K Q J ♦ K 9 6
	♠ 8 7 5 3 2 ♥ 10 6 3 ♦ 7 ♣ K J 10 4

Open Room

West	North	East	South
Dumbovich	de_Wijs	Winkler	Muller
		1♠	Pass
1NT	Pass	2NT1	Pass
3♣	Pass	3♥	Pass
4♣	Pass	4♦	Pass
4♠2	Pass	5♥3	All Pass

1 any GF
2 rkcb
3 2 kc + ♥Q

Closed Room

West	North	East	South
Westra	Honti	Ramondt	Szilagyi
		1♠	Pass
1NT	Pass	2♣1	Pass
2♦1	Pass	2NT	Pass
3♣	Pass	3♥	Pass
4♣	Pass	4NT	Pass
5♥	Pass	6♥	All Pass

1 Extras

This board is a study in how far bidding has advanced in certain areas of the game. As the Italians' success gets more and extensive, other players are stealing their ideas - well plagiarism is the most extreme form of flattery after all. Ten years ago no one used Gazilli - the idea that opener's rebind of two clubs showed extras. These days the Americans call it Cole, and the Poles and Dutch each play their own patented variety. The real merit of this gadget is to let jumps show extra shape plus a smattering of high cards but not be forcing. Here both Easts got into an efficient auction - the Hungarians use the 2NT rebid as a forcing relay to achieve much the same result.

Slam is decent, though not laydown for E/W; an opening club lead might have taxed declarer (one would surely win the ace and hope for the majors to behave rather than rely on the club finesse at trick one). But of course both defenders led their singleton diamond. Now at the table Ramondt followed the practical line of winning in hand and playing a spade at once; how should South signal on this? At the table Szilagyi dropped the eight - he hoped as a suit-preference signal for diamonds, which is surely what it OUGHT to be, even if the partnership had no agreements to that effect. When Honti won his spade ace and returned a trump declarer was able to draw trump and test spades, then fall back on the club finesse. 12 tricks made, as also happened in the other room, where the overtrick was less important.

At double-dummy declarer must win the diamond in dummy and draw three rounds of trumps at once to prevent the ruff. Then a spade to the ten and ace and a diamond return lets declarer win in hand and test spades, to revert to the winning position.

So far so good, but what if North decides to throw a spanner in the works and duck the first spade? His plan would be to force declarer to play a diamond to get back to hand, and now if he takes the ruffing finesse in spades, North can win, and triumphantly cash his winning diamond. Of course this is all very well in theory, but declarer will be awake at the table and noting the tempo of his opponents. It is a little unlucky for North that he is holding the ace-nine doubleton in spades - the sight of that nine might tip declarer off to the winning line, and of course if South ducks the spade smoothly, and North takes a little while to play low on the spade ten, declarer might just get it right for the right reasons, by crossing to hand with a diamond and ruffing a spade.

So what did the field do here? In the Open Series, seven pairs played game, 11 defenders set six hearts by East (only the Finnish South Koistinen being uncharitable enough to lead a club against six hearts, the unlucky opponent being Birman). Five declarers made six hearts as East on a diamond lead, six made it as West on either a top diamond lead. The arithmetically gifted will note that this adds up to 29 results, and there ought to be 32 in total. What of the other three? Two pairs who ought to remain nameless - but won't - bid the E/W cards to six no-trump. Kask-Oja and Elinescu-Wladow were the guilty pairs, but the East players in these partnerships played the cards distinctly better than they had bid them. Winning the diamond lead they knocked out the spade ace, and set up a double-squeeze, reducing to this ending:

	♠ - ♥ - ♦ Q ♣ 8 7 6
♠ - ♥ 8 ♦ -		♠ 6 ♥ J ♦ 9
	♠ 8 ♥ - ♦ - ♣ K J 10

With the position coming down to the diamond menace biting North, and the spade menace hitting South, all that the declarers needed was the club finesse for trick thirteen to go to the club nine. Of course both Norths could have broken up the ending by shifting to a club when in with the spade ace - but where would the fun have been in that?

And what of pair 32, you ask? Well the theme of this tournament on Vugraph has been of rather sporting defenders doubling low-level contracts for the lead, when they could not be sure that they could beat a game in that strain. This time the guilty party will have to accept sole not joint responsibility. Fulvio Fantoni as North decided to make his presence felt after a Gazilli auction from his opponents (1♠-1NT-2♣-2♦). One redouble from Borevkovic later he may have felt less sure of his ground. 2♦ redoubled on a club lead duly collected the two overtricks it was supposed to collect - and that fetched +960! Of course since 6♥ was reached in the other room Fantoni could argue that his enterprise was due to earn an IMP but declarer could not bring home 12 tricks and Croatia collected 14 IMPs.

The Seniors and Women failed to offer any excitement in terms of unusual results here - up to a point. While all but two tables were content to play game or slam in hearts, with the approximately expected results, two pairs in the Seniors attempted to play in diamonds. The French attempted 5♦ down two, the Welsh (spearheaded by a regular contributor to this bulletin) tried the diamond slam and were informed by North that they had erred -down 500. I'm sure we shall be seeing an entry for the best bid hand very shortly…