Score N/S: 60 E/W: 61 Dlr: South K8 962 975 K10743 Q1097 Q103 1042 A98 43 AKJ5 KQJ6 J62 AJ652 874 A83 Q5 West North East South 3      2       3     4

Exhibit #9a. Technique The Play: 1. West leads 10: 5, 6, A. South wins. 2. South leads 3: 2, 9, J. East wins. 3. East leads K: 8, 4, 7. East wins. 4. East leads K: 4, 10, 2. East wins. 5. East leads A: 7, 3, 6. East wins. 6. East leads 5: 8, Q, 9. West wins. 7. West leads A: 3, 2, 5. West wins. 8. West leads 9: K, 6, Q. North wins. 9. North leads 4: J, 2, 8. South wins. 10. South leads A: 7, 8, 3. South wins. 11. South leads 5: 9, K, 4. North wins. 12. North leads 7: Q, J, Q. West wins. 13. West wins the last one with the 10. North/South have just been set. Was it due to bad bidding or play, or was it just bad luck? Who made the worst bid/play? Submit your comments to: You Be the Judge

The Public Responds:

Our first case proved straightforward enough, at least to those who commented at all. It is possible that a low response to a case means that most would-be panelists could not find a solution, and decided simply to lurk. Our first panelists starts us off right. Ruffkid, where did the error occur?

Ruffkid: Trick 10 ace of spades lead.......If ever a time existed for an underlead it is now. Right hand opp has already made his bid and shown extras.

Agreed. But that's only half the answer. Can someone give us the rest of it?

Dustin: The biggest error on this deal occured on trick 10. South made the common play of the aaaA. It is rarely correct to lead the ace from a strong spade suit without the king. Furthermore, West is marked with spade strength (due to his bid). It is generally correct to lead through strength, thus South should begin the spade suit by leading low.

After North dutifully returns spades, South must realize the likely possibility of an endplay. If West is spade-tight, winning the trick with the ace is suicidal. Thus, South should make the safe defensive play of a low spade and let West take the lead. Now regardless of how East plays, South can win two more tricks with the AJ. This is a basic defense against endplays.

Two more panelists say the same thing, throwing in a bit of card reading while they're at it.

Brandon: From looking at the distribution [Technically, you're not supposed to do this. Analyses must be based only on what each player can see.], E/W will win 3 hearts, 2 diamonds, 1 club for a total of 6, while N/S will win 1 D and 1 C, and 1 club trump. Given the unfortunate spade distribution E/W will win 2 Spades, unless West is forced to lead Spades. Then N/S will win 3 Spades and make their bid. It all comes down to putting West on lead at the very end, making him endplayed (is that a verb?).

Round 10 – It can be inferred that West and North have the rest of the Spades and that East is broke. South should lead the 5, not the Ace. North should play the King to take the trick, then lead the 8. South will duck. If West takes the trick with the 10 or Q it will be the last he takes. Whatever he leads will be taken by South's Ace or Jack.

Purple Cow: Was it due to bad bidding or play, or was it just bad luck? Hmmm, a little bit of all of them really.

Bad luck: Neither partner can be aware of the distribution of the cards at the bidding phase. It is indeed bad luck that both East and West were able to score a 3rd-round winner in the red suits. With the 12 table total, and 2 unexpected tricks to East/West, that's 14 tricks. To save their bid, North/South will need to capture an enemy count card. Not an easy task with the lack of texture and shape in both hands. Still... it could have (should have) been done.

Bad play: It almost always comes down to the play. So where did North/South go wrong? Trick 10 of course! So you're sitting South and about to lead Trick 10 knowing you MUST capture an enemy count card. Well, let's think about this. East has bid 3, and shown up with the AK and K and an extra Queen, so his hand is dead. Now consider North, who has bid 2 and only shown up with the K. North expects a spade trick. So...what can be determined about the spade position?

North must hold either Kx or Qxx, West has either Kxxx or Qxxx, and East has 1 or 2 low spades. Hmmm....East cannot (should not) hold a singleton spade, else he'd likely bid only 2. Stay with me here. If East starts with 2, and I started with 5, and I've read West for 4, that leaves only 2 for North. He MUST have Kx! (All of this card reading is actually unnecessary, Qxx in North's hand works just fine, but it's fun isn't it?)

C'mon, PC, get to the point.

Purple Cow: Why not underlead the A and retain control of the trump suit? Now West will lose a count card for sure! North simply takes his high spade and returns the suit. What could be simpler for South now? Duck of course! The Q109 are oustanding, and West is endplayed. [Now it's an adjective.] When West is forced to lead Trick 12, South simply finesses against the Queen for the bid-saving trick.

Good players make their own good fortune. This bid should have been made easily!

As Purple Cow pointed out, the card reading of the hand is quite unnecessary. The correct way to handle South's spade suit, the Ace underlead, should be familiar to visitors of the Master Spades website. It is the subject of a Spades Strategy article, Trump Attack. Readers can also turn to the article on The Endplay at Spades to brush up on that subject.

The court rules the defendant, South, messed royally up at Trick 10. He is sentenced to playing solitaire 'til dawn with a deck of 51. Take away his cigarettes!

Exhibit #9b. Strategy The Play: 1. West leads K: 2, 5, 2. South wins. 2. South leads 5: A, Q, 6. West wins. 3. West leads 8: 6, K, 3. East wins. 4. East leads A: 4, 2, 7. East wins. 5. East leads 10: 5, J, Q. North wins. 6. North leads 3, 10, Q, 4. South wins. 7. South leads 7, 3, 7,2. North wins. 8. North leads 6: Q, K, 8. South wins. 9. South leads 8: 10, J, 4. North wins. 10. North leads 7: 10, A, A: South wins. 11. South leads 9: 4, 8, K. North wins. 12-13. East/West win the last two with spades. East/West, on the verge of winning the game, have been set and now find themselves trailing 462-385. Did they do something wrong or were they merely the victims of bad breaks? Submit your comments to: You Be the Judge

Score N/S: 400 E/W: 445 Dlr: South J87 J97632 Q76 Q 10654 AK84 J82 A3 93 Q105 AK10 K10642 AKQ2 -- 9543 J9875 West North East South 3      1       3     5

The Public Responds:

Our next case separated the experienced players from those who are merely talented. The winning technique is very simple and well known to the experts, but remains a mystery to those who were never shown it. First we'll hear from a man of few words.

Ruffkid: West totally at fault... Trick 3 and spade must hit the table... stop the cross-ruff.

It's as simple as that. In agreement is:

Dustin: After South leads to Trick 2, East-West need to lead spades immediately otherwise North-South will simply crossruff clubs and hearts. One spade lead does the trick. Thereafter, North-South can only make 6 spade tricks at most and one diamond.

Purple Cow: A, the merry crossruff! Tell me young apprentice, what is the defense to a crossruff? Lead Spades! It's been said time and time again, yet poor trump management leads to more sets than any other single factor (see case 9a and others)!

So at Trick 1 South trumps the heart and returns a club. West takes his A, but when North throws the Queen, fails to recognize the danger. Actually that's not quite fair. The diamond switch indicates that he may indeed have recognized it, but he failed to defend it. The only way to stop a crossruff, ongoing or forthcoming, is to lead spades!

Those who are not familiar with this concept are not likely to discover it themselves, even with all cards visible.

Silus Aureus: I think East should have tried to weaken South's trumping power when he got the lead, after seeing his partner's honor card ruffed.

If weakening South's spades is what you really want to do, you would lead hearts again to force him to trump.

Brandon: Once West gains the lead with the A he should lead Spades to reduce South's cutting power. (and unknown to him North's cutting power)

This will work, but it is not South's hand that you are going after. Most players fail to see how a single spade lead, especially one from a small, weak doubleton, can wreak such havoc on the enemy's crossruff. Can you explain it, PC?

Purple Cow: Look at it in this simple perspective. North/South needed eight tricks for the set. They scored the diamond queen, and seven spades individually!!! Obviously, a single spade lead was all that was required [to stop N/S]. Crash two of North/South's spades together, and they no longer are capable of producing eight tricks. Leading spades to cut down on even one enemy ruff is usually correct. Against a crossruff, it's absolutely mandatory.

And how does a defender recognize a crossruff is in the works? PC gave us one suggestion, the fall of the Q under the Ace. Is West the only villain?

Dustin: East, however, has a clearer picture due to his club suit. Since he has such a long club suit, East should recognize the potential for a crossruff. Thus, on Trick 2 when South leads clubs, West should play 2nd-hand low (to preserve an entry), and East will be on lead. A spade lead at this point is best.

Purple Cow: East must take some blame too. He also had a chance to make the killing spade lead at Trick 4 and didn't. Someone has to lead spades quickly. When the diamond 10 hit the table to start Trick 5, the hand was blown.

East/West had three chances to lead a spade and nobody did so. Both players are to blame, and I hope the rest of us have all learned something. Finally, there were a few side issues to be squabbled over, particularly South's bidding and play.

Dustin: Boy, what a sloppily played deal -- by all four players. South bid last and apparently didn't do his math. Since East-West bid game, South's correct bid is 7. The only possible way to remain in the game is to set East-West, so you might as well bid for it.

The sloppy playing began at Trick 2 when South refused to lead trumps. Although leading trump won't set East-West, I believe it is still the correct play.

There were other errors on this deal. North made the common error of weakening his partner's spades by leading hearts. East and West helped North by not leading hearts and refusing to lead spades. This was a poorly played deal on all accounts.

Brandon: Round 2 – South leads clubs rather than spades. That's odd. This implies he wants cuts and not to pull trump, and must have low spades. (In a real game I cant believe an experienced player with AKQ would cut with them instead of leading them.)

Purple Cow: South's 5-bid is troublesome to me. It seems to me that in this situation, the partnership should have an agreement. South can only reasonably expect 4 tricks from this hand. With most (experienced) partners, I'd have bid 7! You need a set, or the game is over. Why not say so? Also, 4 is a reasonable call. Some partners would rather be able to properly read your hand to make decisions in the play. Either is acceptable. But the bid of 5 seems indecisive and strange to me. How did he arrive at 5?

Perhaps we can provide some answers. Readers can judge for themselves if the following reasons are valid. This deal, BTW, was an actual deal played recently on Mystic Island. The South player was highly experienced. These factors were taken into account when South considered his bid:

It is time to reach a verdict on the defendants, East and West. Frankly, they are still looking befuddled and bewildered. "Wha' happen?" They blew the hand, obviously, but this court does not have the stomach to convict a pair who is too simple-minded to know any better. Charges are dropped, case dismissed.

All members of the public are invited to submit their comments in this week's You Be the Judge.