This conundrum was written by Eddie Kantar and was originally published in the book Kantar for the Defense - Volume 2 - you can find out all about it further down the page.
East - West vulnerable
Dealer South
You are West
Opening Lead: ♣Q
South wins the ♣A, partner playing the ♣3. At trick two declarer leads the ♦6 to the ♦J and partner’s ♦K (you play the ♦7).
Partner returns the ♥J. Declarer plays low.
- Which heart do you play? Why?
- You play low, partner continues with the ♥8, and declarer plays low again. Which heart do you play this time? Why? What is your plan?
- You play the ♥A and return the ♥Q to partner’s ♥K, declarer following. Partner now plays the thirteenth heart, declarer discarding the ♦7. What do you discard? Why?
Have a think and click here to reveal the answer
- The ♥3. Partner may be leading from J98x hoping declarer ducks with Kxx. (Declarer will duck if he thinks East is sneakily leading from a QJ9 combination.)
- The ♥A. Now you know your partner has the ♥K. If partner had J98x, declarer would have covered the ♥K holding K9xx. If partner had J98x, his second lead would be his lowest card. Therefore, partner has led the jack from a KJ98 combination and you should unblock and return the suit.
- The ♣2, in order to get a spade shift. (Had you wanted a club continuation you would have discarded a spade.)
KEY LESSON POINTERS
- When partner leads the queen vs. notrump, third hand signals count if one or two high honors remain in dummy after dummy has played. This hand is a common sense exception, because the third hand cannot afford to spare the ♣9. If there were no honors in dummy originally, or no honors remaining after dummy has played, third hand signals attitude.
- Allow for partner to make “surrounding plays” when the dummy to your left has something like 10x, 10xx, 9x, or 9xx. In those cases it is right for partner to lead the jack from KJ9 combinations and the ten from QJ10 combinations.
- Vs. notrump, when faced with a choice of discards from one of two suits (partner now on lead), discard from the suit you do not want partner to lead, retaining both length and strength in the suit you do want led.
Kantar invites his reader to direct every play towards the goal of beating the contract in a variety of hands, bringing focus on counting tricks, points and distribution. Problems range from an intermediate to semi-advanced level and knowledge of basic card combinations is assumed. Each book concludes with a complete list of themes for its 100 problems.
