sfi, on 2015-February-04, 19:18, said:
First the hand:
Not a good game, but the play is the point.
According to Cherdano this disqualifies it for the expert forum (not my opinion)
Quote
This isn't really that difficult a hand, but a couple of expert players didn't recognise what was going on and I haven't ever noticed the key theme before. I'm curious if I've just been missing a crucial part of declarer play all these years.
West leads the C5 and the first trick goes 5-2-T-A. You play two rounds of trump and everyone follows. Now what, and what do you need to make the hand?
More general thoughts in a bit.
My thoughts:
Bridge is a game where pattern recognition is important.
However, the "key themes" are almost endless.
Instead of trying to remember and recognize them all in time (not in the post mortem) it is better to use techniques like playing out the hand in your head always looking out what devious opponents can do.
Here you start with 4 losers, a club and three in the red suits.
Theoretically you can attack and establish 2 diamond tricks for club discards but obviously the defense will likely establish their club trick first.
No good, we need an alternative.
What about playing hearts? Suddenly not so easy to see what the defense can do to get their "four" tricks.
The key theme may be uncommon, but the above technique is not and is in the arsenal of any true expert.
Rainer Herrmann