[PhilG007]

In a high level tournament you are dealt the hand below
with neither side vulnerable:-
♠K6 ♥Q1086 ♦Q52 ♣J643
The dealer on your right, who is a top expert,
opens 7NT (!) The question is twofold:-
1)Do you double for penalties?
2) What is your opening lead?

[MrAce]

1-No

2- Either a spade or a heart. Probably spade K. I do not think declarer opened 7 NT with AQ ♠ hook waiting for me to lead it.

[ahydra]

Quote

1)Do you double for penalties?

I'd love to double for takeout But no, I wouldn't double.

Then again it's hard to see why he's opened 7NT when he has no running suit. At best he can have AQJ10 AKJ AKJ AKQ or something, 32 HCPs but full of holes. More likely he has AQ AK AK AKQ109xx or similar. Or he's messing around, or is mad at partner.

Hence I'd lead a heart.

ahydra

[kenrexford]

Yes. Double and lead a heart. Opener cannot make 7 NT unless he's bidding on an overheard result. I can't be squeezed.

[Trinidad]

I agree with Ken: Double and lead a heart. It may give up a trick, but it will not give declarer the contract... unless, of course, he has a running side suit of griffins (entirely possible for hands posted the day after April 1st). You'll figure out soon enough since declarer will redouble.

Rik

[billw55]

Not every day I defend 7NT with a stopper in every suit. I think declarer's most likely hand type is a very long solid club suit with outside controls. On this theory, ♣Jxxx is beyond price, so that lead is out. A freak diamond suit is also possible. Following this thinking, I expect a major suit lead to beat the contract, and so I do double. If I strike gold and lead into a stiff ace, this could be a big number.

edit: in fact, thinking about it more, I am unable to even construct a hand for declarer that allows him to make 7NT after a heart lead. At most, he can cash 9 tricks in his own hand. To make, he will need a finesse though me, up to dummy. If that works, I will definitely be having a chat with the director.

[ggwhiz]

I agree with double and lead a heart.

Declarer is on tilt and/or the ♣J (or maybe the ♦Q) is a cinch trick.

[gszes]

no
and lead a heart.

It is obvious that declarer has made a gambling bid of some sort
and we do not know just how much they are willing to gamble. If
we x with zero obvious trick AND a crummy lead we may be giving
away the farm of declarer manages to have a finesse option we
are having a hard time imagining now. There just is no sense to
the x. If the contract is going down we are most likely going to
be fine no matter what since it is totally obvious declarer cannot
have 13 from the top and whatever gamble they took may not be
repeated.

The heart lead is made primarily to try and make sure we set the opps
whenever they are due to be set. Failing to X will help assure declarer
does not make any further gambling plays to go along with their gambling
bid and make their contract. In fact the lead of 4th best heart has an
extra chance of making it seem even less likely you hand is the one with
a minor suit stopped (since the 5432 are missing your lead might look like
it is from 5+ hearts).

It is possible that a heart lead (especially away for the Q) might make
declarer suspicious but I remain unconvinced their suspicion will overcome
the probabilities that partner has a long minor rather than you.

Good luck:)

[PhilKing]

We are told the player who opened 7NT is a top expert. We are not given any indication that he is on tilt, so there is no reason to assume he does not have his bid. That makes his possible hands:

♠A
♥A
♦AK
♣AKQTxxxxx

or

♠A
♥AK
♦A
♣AKQTxxxxx

or

♠A
♥AK
♦AK
♣AKQTxxxx

or

♠A
♥A
♦AKJTxxxxxx
♣A

Double is clear. Teammates will presumably get to 7NT (or 7m) as well (the correct technique is to open 2♣, show spades and hearts and THEN bid 7NT, but not even all top experts know that), so if you don't double, you are just conceding IMPs through timidness. Don't kid yourself that beating 7NT undoubled is a good score and that doubling is a risk - neither of those contentions is valid.

Doubling and leading a low spade basically guarantees 300. Doubling and leading a heart is 100-1100, depending on who has the heart king. This is a lead problem, not a bidding problem, and I lead a low spade.

[MrAce]

You re right, i should have doubled also instead of being a wimp.

[mikeh]

PhilKing, on 2014-April-02, 15:13, said:

We are told the player who opened 7NT is a top expert. We are not given any indication that he is on tilt, so there is no reason to assume he does not have his bid. That makes his possible hands:

♠A
♥A
♦AK
♣AKQTxxxxx

or

♠A
♥AK
♦A
♣AKQTxxxxx

or

♠A
♥AK
♦AK
♣AKQTxxxx

or

♠A
♥A
♦AKJTxxxxxx
♣A

Double is clear. Teammates will presumably get to 7NT (or 7m) as well (the correct technique is to open 2♣, show spades and hearts and THEN bid 7NT, but not even all top experts know that), so if you don't double, you are just conceding IMPs through timidness. Don't kid yourself that beating 7NT undoubled is a good score and that doubling is a risk - neither of those contentions is valid.

Doubling and leading a low spade basically guarantees 300. Doubling and leading a heart is 100-1100, depending on who has the heart king. This is a lead problem, not a bidding problem, and I lead a low spade.

The analysis of the double situation is 100% clear and I was astounded that anyone would consider not doubling. Absent an inference of unethical conduct, double cannot ever be wrong.

The lead issue is more interesting, as noted.

I assume the OP is from mps play...now the low spade is clearly correct, since it assures us of +300...the one suit we KNOW declarer's holding is spades....he has the stiff Ace.

It is 50-50 whether dummy or partner holds the spade Q.

Thus leading the K gives us +100 half the time, losing to the sure +300 when dummy has the spade Q.

The other half of the time will give us more than 300 most of the time, but not all of the time: dummy needs the J10x(x....) to hold us to one spade trick, but that means that leading the K will lose 50% of the time, break even when dummy has J10x(x...) and win only when partner can cash at least 2 spade tricks....which means less than half the time.

At imps, however, I think it is right to lead the K: we could hit a huge home run, and are risking only 5 imps to gain anywhere from 5 (we get 500) to much more...imagine partner with QJ9xxx.

I'd rather lead a heart than a low spade at imps, for much the same reasoning....but the low heart is problematic for several reasons.

Either opp could hold the K and that limits us to +100.

IOW, the odds of partner holding a useful heart suit are imo less than the odds of his holding a useful spade suit, both in terms of translating +100 into +300 and of getting a big number.

Edit: while I would expect opener to hold clubs, the best suit I ever held, in terms of a combination of length and strength was AKJ109xxxxx in diamonds, and I lost a trick to Qxx (offside, tho that didn't matter for obvious reasons)

[PhilKing]

mikeh, on 2014-April-02, 17:12, said:

The lead issue is more interesting, as noted.

I pretty much agree with your assessment of the pros and cons of various leads in a vacuum - a low heart or high spade would be clear contenders in a rubber bridge game, for instance. However, I think the silver bullet is that there is a significant non-zero chance that they will not double in the other room (as evidenced by the early votes - if MrAce forgets to double, then it could happen to almost anyone). This must tilt the imp analysis towards the low spade.

[billw55]

mikeh, on 2014-April-02, 17:12, said:

Lengthy analysis

I don't disagree. But I do have a nagging fear in the back of my mind that declarer is either tilting badly, or misread/sorted his hand, etc, and does in fact hold something like ♠AQJTxxxx (maybe he had the ♣K in with his spades, or is just shooting wildly). It would be embarrassing to pay off to this, however rarely, when a heart lead sets him 100% of the time. Even so at matchpoints (or BAM I guess) your argument is persuasive.

[PhilG007]

I have been following the responses to the puzzle I set with great interest and am impressed.
Phil King got the possible declarer hands absolutely spot on. As he says,the crux of the problem is
the bid itself and what holding occasioned it. The interpretation can only be that the bidder has all
13 tricks in his hand....or THINKS he has. Depending on the type of hand held,declarer will never make his
contract if a ♠ or a♥ is led on any of the holdings shown but if declarer has ♥AK he will only
be -1. The one common factor to all the hands given is the bare A♠ and,as you want to make the most of this
chance of a lifetime,you should double and lead a ♠. Leading the small one will yield +300 but if you are feeling
bold,lead the king. It won't cost the contact and partner could have a field day(!) The full deal was :-

South ♠K6 ♥Q1086 ♦Q52 ♣J643
West ♠98532 ♥KJ43 ♦10976♣ -
North ♠QJ1074 ♥9752 ♦J843 ♣-
East ♠A ♥A ♦AK ♣AKQ1098752

If you doubled and led ♠K +800
♠6 +300
♥6 +100
♦+100
♣3 -1790

If you failed to double
and led ♠K +200
♠6 +100
♥6 +50
♦2+50
♣3 -1520

[whereagles]

Of course you double. If it makes, it's a zero anyway

Any non-club lead should beat it.