Tom Drijver’s 6 August tournament: video replay and deal analysis

Did you play the Ambassador’s tournament hosted by Tom Drijver on 6 August? Whether yes or no, watch a video replay of his tournament and benefit from Tom’s tips to improve your level!

Replay of Tom Drijver’s 6 August tournament

Trump in the air

You are sitting South in a 10 board tournament. MP scoring.

Based on the information provided, if I were thinking for myself as a bidder, I would likely choose option 2 and bid 4 hearts. Bidding 4 hearts traditionally shows a six-card heart suit, but in this particular situation where the opponent’s give me little bidding spade, it is highly probable that my partner would bid 3NT. Therefore, to ensure that our heart fit is not overlooked, I decided to bid 4 hearts directly.

West leads the ten of spades.

My Losers: 2 clubs, 1 diamond and 1 spade.

After the spade 10, J and the Q, east returned a club to the ace and now its time to make a plan.

East’s bid of 3 spades showed 6 of 7 spaded. So I decided to draw 2 rounds of trumps.

With the additional information from being back in dummy and having a clearer picture of East’s likely distribution, you now know that East has either 7 spades, 3 hearts, 2 diamonds, and 1 club or 6 spades, 3 hearts, 3 diamonds, and 1 club. Based on this, you have to adapt your plan accordingly.

Please think for yourself how to play before reading on.

My options:

Draw the last trump and hope of the diamonds to break 3-3
Playing diamond ace, diamond to the king and a diamond

After playing diamond ace, diamond to the king this is the situation.

So now I played the ten of diamonds. When east ruffs I play small and I will discard a club of the Q of diamonds and when east does not ruff I will ruff the five of diamonds in dummy. Both choiced will lead to 10 tricks or a score of 72,50%.

The whole deal: