A Coup For You

Playing in the final match of a strong regional Swiss Teams, you are competing for the win. There are several other teams within striking range. You have 90 VP’s after six matches. My teams call this “Miller Par.” My theory is that if you put up 15 VP’s per match in a flighted event, you will probably win. If it is stratified, you will need a few more.

One of the concepts behind “Miller Par” is to get your team to quit thinking about winning matches and focus on winning VP’s. It is amazing how many players, even experts, lose track of this concept.

Back to the hand.

As South, you pick up the following: T 6 3 T 9 8 3 A 4 J 6 5 3.

With neither Vulnerable, the auction proceeds as follows:

RHO opens 1, you pass, and LHO calls 1. Partner overcalls 1 and RHO leaps to 3NT.

Partner has asked for a spade lead, but declarer seems ready for that. You have a nasty surprise in declarer’s suit, and three cards in partner’s suit. What should you lead?

Make your choice before viewing the solution.

This entry was posted on Monday, April 27th, 2009 at 10:04 pm and is filed under Bidding. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.