Sisyphus and me (subtitle – bridge hell)

It didn’t matter how many times I played this maddening hand yesterday – I was always going down – the layout of the opponents’ cards eluding me with each line of play I tried.

In each case the auction was the same. My WEST opened the bidding 3 clubs, which was passed around to me. I held AK9   QJ7xx  853  73, and we were red vs white. Each time I braved a 3 heart bid – which was rewarded with a gentle 4 heart response from Keith, holding an opening bid of his own including AK9x of hearts. There’s a nice partner !

The opening lead was the seven of diamonds. I played dummy’s Ace. EAST playing the deuce – highly encouraging.

Attempt #1

I played a trump to the queen and a trump back to dummy’s Ace. EAST pitched a discouraging spade (clearly from length)

I decided my best bet to make ten tricks was to build the queen of clubs as a trick. So, needing two dummy entries, I left the trumps alone and played a low club from the dummy. EAST won the king (good !) and cashed the king of diamonds and gave her partner a spade ruff. Down 1. WEST had been 0-3-3-7. 

The winning line was simply to draw trumps and double hook the spades.

Attempt #2

Again I played a trump to the queen and a trump back to dummy’s Ace. EAST pitched a discouraging spade (clearly from length)

This time I decided my best bet was both the queen and the jack of spades onside. I immediately drew the last trump with dummy’s king and led a spade to the nine. It lost to the queen, and now there was no more time or entries to establish the club queen for trick 10. WEST was 1-3-2-7.

The winning line here was to set up the club queen in dummy, and to do so before drawing West’s last trump, while I had an extra trump entry to dummy.

Attempt #3

Again I played a trump to the queen and a trump back to dummy’s Ace. EAST pitched a discouraging spade (clearly from length)

This time I really wasn’t sure which black suit I should count on for the tenth trick. Was there a way to avoid a guess? I decided to hedge my bets. I reasoned as long as WEST had at least one spade (likely an honor from his failure to lead one) I could defer the decision, depending on the apparent count in the diamond suit.

I abandoned trumps, and led dummy’s last diamond. I figured if WEST played up the line in diamonds, then clubs were not likely to come home (his shape must be 1-3-3-6). In that case, I would bank on split spade honours. That is, I would win the first spade trick with a high honour, dropping the presumed honour on my left. (This seemed more likely than a stiff small spade since he had not led one at trick one)

I was not too worried about a spade ruff as there was no such table vibe, including no unnaturally low club lead at trick one fishing for a spade shift.

WEST played up the line on the second round of diamonds. EAST tapped the dummy with another diamond. I ruffed, and played a spade to my Ace. There was no timber falling from West though. He had begun with 1-3-3-6 shape and had elected to lead a diamond from Q10x as his surprise attack. I ended up down 1. Here, the winning line was a double spade finesse.

Attempt #4

Again I played a trump to the queen and a trump back to dummy’s Ace. EAST pitched a discouraging spade (clearly from length)

Again, I abandoned trumps, preserving entries, and led dummy’s last diamond. When West high – lowed in diamonds, he rated to be 1-3-2-7. I would know what to do depending on East’s next move.

But West high lowed in diamonds because he began with four diamonds, not two !

Which meant he had a spade void, and his grateful partner found that shift pretty damn quickly.

Modern preempts ! – who needs a 7 card suit when a 6-4 shape is eminently suitable?

The layout was something like

Dealer: West Vul: NS		North
		♠	108xx
		♥	AK9x
		♦	A9
		♣	Q9x
West				East
♠	void			♠	QJ7xxx
♥	10xx			♥	x
♦	Q10xx			♦	KJxx
♣	A10xxxx			♣	KJ
		South
		♠	AK9
		♥	QJ7xx
		♦	853
		♣	73

At the other table, our opponents conservatively stopped in 2 hearts (clearly no 3 club opener from my team mate). Had I made 4 hearts, we would have won 10 imps – a 17 imp swing.

Sisyphus had no choice. No matter how many times he pushed the boulder to the top of the mountain, it always rolled back to the bottom. His personal hell being he was doomed to do this for eternity.

Bill Murray was doomed to relive the same day over and over again until he found true love in the movie Groundhog Day.

I gave up this hand after only four attempts. Masochism only runs so deep in my genes.

Should you build up the club queen? Should you take a double hook in spades? Should you drop a spade honor offside and then finesse for the other. In bridge hell, you never get these decisions right.