District Pairs Qualifier, St Andrew

We missed the qualifying heat of the district pairs that was played at the Buchanan because we were playing a match, so we headed to the St Andrew bridge club to take part in theirs. Initially Norman wasn't sure whether we'd be better of playing in the St Andrew or the GBC heat, but then I noticed that the rules explicitly state that you can keep trying to qualify if you fail, so we had nothing to lose. We didn't fail, qualifying relatively comfortably in second place with 54%.

Here's one where Bill declared 2♠. It was tricky, and we did manage to beat it. I'm not sure if he could have played it better, or if we just did well in defence. Double Dummy, it's one off.

♠ A 4 ♥ T 8 7  ♦ K 7 6 5 2  ♣ A K 2 ♠ Q J 9 ♥ Q 2 ♦ 9 8 3  ♣ T 7 6 5 3 * * * * ♠ 8 3 ♥ A K J 9 ♦ A Q J T ♣ Q 8 4 ♠ K T 7 6 5 2 ♥ 6 5 4 3 ♦ 4 ♣ J 9

Norman Bill John Suresh W N E S 1NT X 2♥ - 2♠ - -

I led the ♥K, and another ♥ to Norman's Q. Norma switched to a ♣. Declarer has 7 tricks, and can make an eighth if he can contrive to ruff the fourth heart, so I think we might already have missed our chance to defeat this contract legitimately - I probably need to lead a trump at trick two. However, Bill now drew two rounds of trumps and gave up the lead in hearts, and it was easy enough for us to cash our 6 tricks for one off. It's actually not easy for declarer - I think you have to just play a heart back at trick three, but you can't afford to over-ruff anything in dummy, so you're pretty much playing for spades to be exactly as they are. On the other hand, I don't think there are many other options.

♠♥♦♣

Here's one that I think I may have misbid, but my hand is a bit of a freak, and I can't figure out how to get the information I need from my partner.....

♠ Q T ♥ Q 8 5 ♦ A J 7 2   ♣ A Q 5 4

♠ A J 7 6 4 2 ♥ K J T 9 6 2 ♦ T ♣ -

W E 1NT 2♥ 2♠ 3♥ 3NT 4♥

I'll be honest, thoughts of a slam didn't even really cross my mind during the auction, but they maybe should have. There are basically 5 cards I care about, the ♠KQ, the ♥AQ and the ♦A. That's a total of 15 points. There are another 16 points that are totally useless to me ♦KQJ, ♣AKQJ. So, I know that Norman has at least 15 points out of the 31 that are missing. What are the odds he has the ones I need for a slam? Well, the slam's going to be a reasonable shot if he has either ace and at least two other cards, but that's surely less than 50%. I don't really see a sensible way to find out what he's got - maybe if he can agree a suit before we get to the 4 level I can try Blackwood, but as it happens, he can't.