Glasgow League: Team Rowan vs Shawlands

We managed to get the children to bed 15 minutes before the start of this match and I'm sure that helped, as Anna and I had a good game throughout. Three times we doubled them in 1NT. This was the most profitable:

Our doubles of a Weak NT are 14+, which happens quite a lot. In general I will only remove with a weak hand with a long suit. Here I am very happy to pass.

I'm not sure if East-West had a method to escape, especially as this was a double from the pass-out seat where different agreements apply. You can see that running to 2♦ would have been bad too, but not as bad as 1NT.

I led a Heart. Declarer won his ♥J in hand and started on Diamonds. They do not sit kindly. Anna won and continued Hearts. I didn't know how the Hearts were splitting, so took my ♥Q and switched to the ♣Q. This turned out to be a good switch, as it set up Anna's top Clubs.

Declarer finished with just one Spade and one Heart, for 1NTx-5 and -1100. There was the possiblity of a third trick for declarer if he'd hung on to a Club, but was forced to find a lot of discards.

On the other tables the results were 1NTx-4, 1NT-3 and North-South playing 2NT+2 when West made a surprising transfer over 1NT.

This was a hand where I could have defended better:

I led a low Heart, hoping partner had something in the suit. Anna produced the Queen which declarer won in hand and immediately led the King of Spades. I ducked, and declarer started setting up the Diamonds. My hope was that Anna had the ♥T, in which case we could get two Hearts, two Diamonds and the Ace of Spades. So I tried the Jack of Hearts, but when that didn't work out declarer actually had an overtrick for 3NT+1.

It was a mistake to duck the King of Spades. I know from the auction that Anna's ♥Q is her only high card. So if declarer has ♠KJ(x) then he always has five Spades, and the Ace-King of Hearts and Spades. That's nine tricks, with no shortage of entries to dummy.

So I might as well take my ♠A. I still have a decision to make, whether to go for the Hearts, or the Clubs. Here the ♣Q switch would work (same as it did against 1NTx in the hand above), as declarer doesn't now have the entries to set up Spades and Diamonds and goes off a lot. However, if I continue Hearts (as I probably would have) declarer still makes it comfortably, so I think I was quite far away from beating 3NT.

On the other tables East-West played 4♠-1, 3♦+1 and 3NT-2 by West, where North's Club lead makes it more difficult (declarer needs to play on Diamonds not Spades).

In the end we won our table by +3290 and the match by +3080 to win 13-3. Team Rowan are (for now at least) top of Division Two!