The BBO ACBL Club Bulletin #9

By Dan Israeli (ACBL_17)

Welcome to this week's ACBL Club Bulletin.
Every week I will bring a few interesting hands played in our very own ACBL games, and try to show you how the hand should be bid and played. Of course, Bridge is not an exact science, so I will try to bring more than one angle. I hope you will find this interesting and useful.

If you come across an interesting hand you'd like to share and have analyzed, or if you have an interesting story to tell or a question to ask, feel free to email me.
My email address is ehhehh@gmail.com.

A few preliminary notes:

1. I try to keep the bidding simple. The Basic Sayc system is used, but mostly it is common sense bridge, added with a few simple gadgets.

2. Some boards will require a more scientific approach, but nothing really major. I believe good bridge can be played without 200 pages of agreements.

This week I have only one hand for you, but it's a nice one. It was played last Wednesday in the 9pm speedball game.
If you are curious to see the field results, you can check the traveler here.
The recommended auction is illustrated here:

(Click the NEXT button to view the auction)


1st Scenario:

In this scenario, west leads a top heart, gets an encouraging signal from his partner and continues the suit, cashing 4 tricks. This may seem like a good start for the defense, but in fact it will lead to west being squeezed.

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This squeeze is called a criss-cross squeeze. You can read more about it online, or in various bridge literature.
By cashing the 4 heart tricks, EW rectified the count for declarer, and allowed the squeeze to materialize.

2nd Scenario:

In this scenario, west leads something other than a top heart.
Declarer will most probably go down here, because he is still short 1 trick, and once he surrenders the lead EW can cash their 4 heart tricks, which will set him by one. The squeeze option is not available here, because the count is not rectified.

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The rule of 11 is a very useful tool, sometimes for the defenders and sometimes for declarer. You can look it up online, or ask me about it.

That's it for today.
I hope you had a good time.
See you next week!

Dan Israeli