Threeee Nooo Trump!

While watching the 2013 Spingold Finals, I was reminded of the dearly departed Simon Marinker, one of my favourite Precision partners, who became famous locally for his frequent calls of ‘Threee Nooo Trump!’ After reaching his late 80’s with a failing memory his knowledge of Precision became limited to 1♣ Strong – 1 ♦ Weak. Not surprisingly 3NT was the abrupt ending to many an auction. The meaning was clear – ‘I’m not sure what’s going on, but let me play it.’ As he was a magnificent player of the cards with dummy in view, this frequently led to a major success. Often he sheepishly admitted after a steal, ‘I had to do a bit of razzle-dazzle on that one.’

In the Spingold Final on fully 44% of the boards 3NT was the final contract at one or both tables. Not all of these made. The accuracy was roughly 2 pluses for every minus with swings in both directions. The winning Polish team bid just one slam and not one contract was doubled (Simon never doubled and rarely bid slam, how could he?) In the end we were treated to a very entertaining, close match in which card play rather than bidding accuracy was most often the determining factor.

The Polish pair, Kalita-Nowosadzki, declared 3NT on 11 boards out of 64, making 7 times, going down, 4. They gained 13 IMPs when making, lost 14 when going down. For the ‘Internationls’ the most active pair was Grue-Moss who declared 3NT in 10 of the 48 boards they played. They made their contract on 7 occasions and went down on 3. The net gain for these pairs was 2 IMPs. Going down proved expensive, 30 IMPs over 7 boards, so if either pair could have avoided the big swings they would have done much better. So why so much activity with so little to show for it?

Well, in a team game to play for minimum loss one must bid 3NT if the opponents are going to do so. Of the 15 boards where both tables were in 3NT, on 5 occasions both declarers went down, so no big losses were encountered there. On the other hand it can be very expensive to bid 3NT and go down when the tricky devils at the other table go plus in a different contract. So we can come up with this rule: don’t bid 3NT when it doesn’t make. Call it the Preacher’s Rule and write it down just below the Rabbi’s Rule.

By the time Board 6 came along we had already witnessed two contracts of 3NT going down 2. Board 5 was an 11 IMP swing due to Morgan-Amoils bidding and making 5♦ on an ‘undiscussed’ auction while Kalita-Nowosadzki were down in 3NT. Throughout the Spingold play Allan Falk had been complaining about the young players bidding and making unmakeable slams when their senior-citizen opponents stopped safely in game. Now the seniors were disposed of, but the annoyance resurfaced when Jacob Morgan made 5♦ on the opening lead of an unsupported ace.

Falk:  As he grows older, Morgan will learn that ‘no way to go down’ is the best kind of contract.

That advice is hard to take after one has just gained 11 IMPs on initiative, but Jacob Morgan may accept that way of thinking after he ages several decades. The very next hand provided Falk with even more ammunition.

The American bidding was elemental 1♣ – 2NT; 3NT – Pass. Nothing wrong with the ending in 3NT, in fact, a must-do according to commentators Kit Woolsey and Larry Cohen: 24 HCP evenly divided between the hands, 9 controls, 8-7-6-5 division of sides – a most normal and desirable contract. Meckwell would have bid it, but unfortunately Meckwell had been relegated to the Swiss. There was a problem: it doesn’t make. A spade was led, and declarer went after clubs immediately hoping for a miracle, but this led to down 3 when he became awkwardly placed in the ending.

At the other table Jacek Kalita opened a Polish 1♣ and the bidding proceeded 1♣-1♦(waiting); 1♥– 2NT; Pass. With essentially the same knowledge available to the opening bidder it came down to a matter of judgment. Kalita found the courage to pass with a lack of umph in his club suit. At this table Grue’s lead was a potentially damaging diamond, but Michal Nowosadzki began by running the ♥T successfully, setting up 4 tricks in the suit, establishing a spade and making 8 tricks before the defenders got around to attacking clubs. That resulted in a gain of 9 IMPs, and a vindication of the admonition to bid only contracts that make. Perhaps also to Falk’s liking is the following spectacular hand where 3NT is double dummy makeable on any lead.

 

At the other table 3♦ was passed out, making 110. East has no satisfactory balancing bid against the preempt, but Jacek Kalita made do with a wide ranging double. Nowosadzki had hearts, but luckily not enough to force in that direction. Kalita then had to guess 3NT rather than introduce his fine spade suit. In this awkward manner the Poles reached the best contract, so it was left to declarer to bring home this double dummy game through double dummy play. Moss, true to his nature, began with the off-beat lead of the ♣9 rather than the ♦Q from his advertised suit. The club might have worked, but here it gave the timing for a free finesse picking off partner’s ♣K.

Kalita had to play the spades for 5 tricks which he managed with the ♠4 to the ♠J and a finesse of the ♠8. The ♥A dropped the singleton ♥K and Moss showed out on the second round of clubs. The hope remained that Moss could be endplayed to give a ninth trick to the ♥T in the dummy or the ♦K in declarer’s hand. So it transpired, a magnificent effort, of the kind that separates the expert from the card pushers.

Intellectually satisfying is the fact that no one did anything wrong and the bids were quite understandable under the circumstances. The preempt was on a 7-card suit, not the 6-card effort we often observe. That being so, the preempt sowed the seeds of its own destruction. There was a right answer and declarer found it using logic based on the information available, nonetheless there was luck involved, in particular, the singleton spade in Moss’s hand was a significant card, the ♠9. When it appeared on the first round of the suit, the law of restricted choice came into effect, so the second round finesse of the ♠8 became the marked play.

This is much like explaining how the magician performs his astounding trick. That doesn’t mean we can do it ourselves, but it does remove the act from the realm of magic. Houdini never revealed how he did it. During a game there are many more difficult decisions to be made that revolve around several possibilities, the trick being to choose the one that will conform most closely to the actual lie of the cards. Sure things are fine, but they are rare. Risk is what drives the game.

We can see Falk’s attraction to bullet-proof contracts, but there is more to bridge than double dummy analysis allows, Horatio. Truth is stranger than fiction, practice more interesting than theory. For the Internationals Morgan-Amoils achieved one big success (13 IMPs) by bidding 3NT when Kalita-Nowosadzki were in 4♥ going down 2. In theory it should have gone the other way around. Should we laugh or cry?

This is the kind of bidding from which our dear Simon often benefited, and again it was undeservedly successful. Rather than leading his fourth highest and setting the contract 4 tricks, Gawel led his to his partner’s queen-high suit, resulting in 10 tricks off the top for declarer. At the other table Bertheau-Bessis were more restrained in the bidding and EW reached the virtuous 4♥. However, something happened on the way to 10 tricks.

Playing in an iron-clad contract doesn’t guarantee success. The lead was an uninspired ♠7. Declarer took the ♠A and lost a heart to the jack. Spades were continued, declarer belatedly pitching the §Q. Now it was merely a matter of getting to lead a second heart towards dummy’s potent ♥K76 combination. Alas, declarer led the convenient ♥K from his hand and lost control as Bessis could get to ruff a diamond with the ♥2. I am sure something like this has happened to us all.

For those skeptical of the principle of restricted choice we note it failed to provide the proper guidance. As this was IMP play, safety was the paramount consideration and on the bidding North was marked with the ♥A. Declarer could have succeeded even with the dangerous approach of winning the ♠K, pitching the §Q on the ♠A, and going to dummy with the ♦K to finesse in hearts. Declarer can afford to lose 3 trump tricks, but not 4.

 There were 13 boards on which 3NT was declared at one table only. It made 6 times, for a gain of 42 IMPs and it went down 7 times for a loss 29 IMPs. The figures bear out the advantages of bidding 3NT on speculation with a less than a 50-50 chance of making. 3NT against a part score in the other room gained 38 IMPs on 3 boards. That explains the attraction to stretching.  Two of these swung in favour of Grue-Moss when the killing lead was not found. One may conclude that the advantage of stretching is based on the fact that errors are a part of the game, even at the expert level.

Putting pressure on the opponents in hopes of a costly error is a valid strategy and 3NT lends itself best to such a strategy. If you always make your 3NT contracts you are not bidding them frequently enough.