Unilateral Sacrifice!!!

[@twiggypodge9857]

Excellent commentary!! Logic very well thought out and explained. I'm just a learner of only a few months.. Kai, you take your time ..not rushing while showing us!! Iv learned lots today, great teacher !!!!

[@BridginWithKai]

I'm glad it was helpful!

[@tassietiger5500]

Great analysis. I would have taken the double finesse in spades, made the contract as the cards lay but gone down an extra trick if west had both A and Q spades. In 5D the declarer needs to take the right view in diamonds i.e. pinning the D10 in the south hand. In 5C the declarer needs to take both diamond and spade views correctly. Not very likely if south hides the AH by leading KH followed by 6H.

[@joz4re]

Great how you explain all the moves and the reasoning behind each move and what the potential outcome is. Makes you really think about the hand and what the outcome could possibly be and weather to bid or not.

[@blcmd]

For the 1❤ bid, you said “you aren’t really that interested in game” opposite partner’s passed hand. Give partner as little as AQxx xx xxx xxxx and you are favorite for making 4H/4S.

[@rebageorgiadis3861]

Excellent explanations and play!

[@pimrajasaari9037]

Thanks very much! 😊

[@pimrajasaari9037]

I like you explaining

[@kiwi1fruit]

great play of the hand !

[@yvescharignon5613]

👋👋👋

[@vytautasrekus4320]

Golden rule: level 5 belongs to opponents!

[@williamthurl2607]

5H is mad . Better to get involved earlier and try 3S over 3D.

[@serapuff]

8:58 - does ducking qD guarantee that opponents have to play another D for you without them making a mistake?

[@BridginWithKai]

Yes, I should have ducked the Q !D

[@rewolff2]

I would seriously consider the 5H. and I wouldn't have found the king of spades. Nicely done!

[@SimonMostyn]

I assess the West hand is a clear opener. I don’t open all 11 counts but this is a good one with a nice 5 card C suit and good intermediates. It depends who you are playing against, but think it’s dangerous to assume from East’s CK at trick 2 that the Ace is with West. Many people would play the King asking for count from a holding including CAK to see if another round is cashing.

[@victorfinberg8595]

nicely done. the bad news is, only one opponent bid the minor game, and they went down

[@oakleyg2870]

Just found your channel. Great stuff! I can tell I'm about to get better as a bridge player. Subscribing now.

[@adsoyad2607]

Really cool hand! I just discovered your channel, you're such a good presenter and teacher. The way you layed down everything was so clear and easy to follow, which is a rarity on bridge youtube. Do you focus on livestreaming or are you planning on putting out more videos on this channel? Also do you have any book/resource recommendations for elimination plays?

[@BridginWithKai]

Glad you enjoyed it! I am planning on posting many more videos to this channel! I will be making Vlog videos on my current trip to Uganda. I am playing for the USA University team in the FISU University MindSport Championships. The preparation day vlog will be coming out today. If you want to see more of me right now I post on the ACBL KZbin Channel: www.youtube.com/@ACBLbridge

[@adsoyad2607]

@@BridginWithKai Awesome! I never knew about the ACBL channel, looking forward to future videos

[@billrose5146]

Good elimination play.

[@thomasahlin7612]

Not being Vul was a big advantage. Why didnt you double the three D bid by East...showing spades

[@BridginWithKai]

Double certainly is an interesting call. I actually think it would work here. Because if partner bids spades you are happy, if partner bids diamonds you bid 3h and this would be implying a stronger hand. Possibly scaring them away from a making game. I like it!

[@gin6839]

Wow!!!!😊

[@giorgosgernas9698]

Well if I was playing sayc then I would likely bid hearts a second time to communicate interest in a sacrifice . But normally I play SMP so I would bid preempt knowing partner has 9 points at best.

[@nima8071]

King of spades is the play, endplaying LHO. If you're playing with experts or good flight A players, I like the sac personally. Opps are finding and making a minor suit game. I would stick 3H over 3D personally, especially if you're willing to bid 5H over 5m. On shape, you're a K better than opening, and you can probably assume a mild heart fit. You can also scare off opps from the game, especially if the bidding goes ...-3H-4C-4H-?

[@BridginWithKai]

Good point. However, I am not sure that it would always scare the opponents off of game, In some distributions it may encourage them to go to game even further, especially if one of them has a Heart void.

[@JonCookeBridge]

@@BridginWithKai I wouldn’t be overly concerned with them bidding a game “because of your 3H bid”. Both opponents are limited so over 3H most likely they’ll be in compete to 4D or pass mode rather than looking to bid a game they otherwise wouldn’t bid. LHO already knows his partner doesn’t have much wastage in hearts due to no 2N bid. Sometimes raising partner might let a player with xxx in the suit visualise the shortage opposite, but here it’s not a fit auction so xxx of hearts will still look bad.

[@SuperJordan256]

Is it so obvious that East must have the CQ when they lead the CK at trick 2?

[@richardfarrer5616]

Though it wouldn't affect the final contract here, how would North interpret 5D from you? It can't be slam interest since you were willing to let them play in 3D. It can't be single suited in hearts since you would just bid them. It's certainly not showing clubs. So 4-6 or 5-6 (or even better) in the majors seems likely. That give North a chance to bid 5S with Qxxxx and a singleton or doubleton heart, say. And, if they bid 6C over you, North knows that a four or five card spade suit is likely to be bad news for defence so might raise to 6H on Jxx, say. Congratulations on the play though. I spotted the KS after you had telegraphed it in the explanation but I doubt I would have found it at the table.

[@BridginWithKai]

Oh! That's a great point. I didn't want to cause a problem with a misunderstanding. I Do think that you are right though.

[@artquey8343]

I would have bid 3H after 3D; when they reach the game in a minor, your pard. should go to 5H himself. In any case, nice thinking, my friend! (Wonder where you learned to "think outside the box" like that!)

[@isaacstone3934]

I suspect his partner may have passed instead of bidding 5!H over 5!C if he bid 3!H over 3!D, since p is 4333 with a defensive honor in diamonds

[@dkinrys]

Wow, I'm glad the KZbin algorithm gods recommended me to you. I love the way you narrate this hand: very fun and vibrant, but also informative. I can't imagine how disappointed you must have been when dummy came down with no spades honour 😱 How do you keep track of which opp had which honour, and then use that to infer who has what by counting HCP? That's something I'm trying to do, but I'm also trying to keep track of outstanding trumps, suit distributions, intermediate cards... Cognitive overload!

[@BridginWithKai]

Yea, its all a lot. The key is understanding which one you need to focus your mind's energy on depending on the situation. Of course, there are players who can do all at once on every single hand they play and that just takes years of experience. I cannot do that yet, but I knew this hand had a lot to do with HCP because of the limited point ranges that were indicated from the bidding. So I decided to focus my energy in that form of thinking.

[@jyutzler]

The starting point is having the clarity of thought to know what matters. Players who play too fast don't even try to figure these things out. Players who play too slow don't know what matters and get brainlocked trying to figure out everything. The experts fall in the middle.

[@dkinrys]

Thanks, that's all great advice!

[@JonCookeBridge]

Did you consider 5D instead of 5H, to involve spades?

[@JonCookeBridge]

You imply that LHO holding: QTx x Qxxx AJTxx is less likely than: AQx x xxxx AJTxx I don’t think that’s correct. I think there are more players making a try on that first hand than taking that complete set of actions on the second. If west had neither the sA or Q, I would expect west to discourage clubs and a good East to switch to a spade at trick 3. Most likely the spade honours are split anyway, but that’s fine - you can just use your two trump entries to lead towards your spade honours.

[@BridginWithKai]

I did not consider 5D. I didn't know that it implied Spades, But now I do. To your second comment: Not exactly, I am implying that they are more likely to make a try on Atx x Qxxx AJtxx. My line fails when they are gutsy enough to make a try with your first hand.

[@JonCookeBridge]

@@BridginWithKai It only matters when he has AQx of spades. You can just lead towards your spades twice when he has ATx spade, using hJ and a heart pip as entries. You are right that your line only fails if he has my first hand, but it only gains when he has my second, against the alternative of leading to the J then to the K of spades. It breaks even if the hand is your suggestion. Once in a while LHO has underled the dA and both spades are onside too!

[@markywarky1234]

I also think that 5H is a terrible bid. Even if 5C/D was cold and 5H was 1 down it would still be a terrible bid, and the reason is that you broke partnership discipline. Partner has heard the same auction you have, and has passed. If you wanted to consider a sac, you should have bid hearts again earlier.

[@billrose5146]

They get some pretty good luck to hit 5C with 23 hcp. The spade layout and doubleton 10D is lucky. That's the trouble with a sac bid ... a good result (i.e. not too many down) is often because you would have set the contract!

[@G.Aaron.Fisher]

Agreed. It's possible to eek out a little bit of value by threading the needle as happened here. But you need an incredibly strong read on the situation to even think about that sort of play. It's just so disastrous if you're off in your evaluation in either direction for a modest gain if everything goes according to plan. In a tournament using matchpoint scoring, you're happy to make any play that works over half the time. But playing for total points, it needs to work something like 80% of the time when you're risking a -400 point swing for the chance at +100. (Back-of-the-envelope estimations at how much we could lose compared to sac'ing when we could set them, or losing more tricks on the sac than we accounted for.) Does it work over 80% of the time here? I honestly don't know. I wouldn't trust my own read to be that solid. But I respect Kai for thinking they had the table nailed, and being correct.

[@ggorshkov]

This is a great example of bad sacrifice. By your own admission opponents get to the thin game. They are probably going to make it less than half of the time. Even with an actual hand that makes double dummy no guarantee that declarer will get it right. He may play N for Kxx or Kx. In first case you must play Q from the hand in second play low to J followed by A. Not to mention he need to get SP right too. And there are many hands where the game is hopeless. For example, exchange Adi and Acl in opps hands. But lets say game is going to make 50% of the time. So when you right you will be gaining +100 (3 imps) and when you are wrong will lose 600 (13 IMPS) not a good odds

[@BridginWithKai]

I can't entirely agree, The bidding rates for the opponents are highly distributional potentially rendering your spades and or hearts irrelevant. Else LHO had no reason to be making a 4C bid. This case is probably the most balanced the hand could be. There are plenty more distributional hand possibilities that could allow a 5m contract to be stone cold. Furthermore, with a more distributional hand the sacrifice is even more potent as our double fit will be stronger allowing us to possibly lose fewer tricks with our own distribution Although I do agree that the play in this particular isn't clear, what I do think is clearer is to play the diamond suit starting with the QD because my hand is more likely to have the doubleton diamond from the bidding, the guess is whether to go back and finesse or try to drop the 10 doubleton.

[@ggorshkov]

@@BridginWithKai It is difficult to asset exactly how often the game will make. But my point is still the same. Even if game will make 70% of the time (and it is very generous estimate) it is still not profitable on the long run since you are risking 13 IMPS to win 3

[@JonCookeBridge]

@@ggorshkov 500 is not what you’d expect the tariff to be before you see dummy. Catching partner with no spade honour on this auction is a bit unlucky. Just catch partner with Qxxx xxx xxx xxx and it’s only 300. You shouldn’t base your imp risk reward estimates on 100% down 3.

[@mlahut]

​@@JonCookeBridge300 vs 500 is not the only consideration. If partner in fact has Qx of spades you may just have two natural spade tricks on defense. -300 feels real bad when the other table is on -130

[@JonCookeBridge]

@@mlahut Right. You need to assess the risks and rewards and decide which is better on average across the full range of hands that might be in play. Ive not commented on where I get to attempting to do that - it seems to me that it’s close - all I said is that in assessing whether to bid it’s a mistake to assume you’ll always go 3 down.

[@johnlv12]

They are not going to pin the 10 of diamonds unless they are psychic. They lose a heart, a club, and a diamond.

[@twostate7822]

I would have passed without a lot of thought and defended. If game is bid at both tables and makes, and you go for 500, you gain 3 IMPs. If the game goes down, you lose 12 IMPs. If partner has 9 of diamonds instead of a small one, or the diamond ace is switched, then the contract is almost certainly going down and that was a phantom sac. There's all kind of analysis that can be done with various contracts making or not making. The opponents didn't cue bid hearts or spades (how much can you trust the opponents?) and a void in hearts is much less likely than a singleton, so probably at least 1 heart is cashing, and the opening bid is on your right so you likely have a natural spade trick. On a different layout, maybe you have 2 spades and a heart trick. All factors in favor of passing. On the play, after drawing trump ending in dummy, I would play East for one of the spade honors since they opened the bidding, and bid one more to game, and finesse the jack. If necessary, you can afford to play a 3rd round of trump to dummy and play up to the king of spades. I don't know how much you can trust East to not have the spade ace. If you place East with AJ of diamonds, KQ of clubs, 2 hearts, they also have at least 3 spades or west would have had 4 spades and would have bid spades or made a negative double. So basically, East is marked with a weak NT, and opposite a passed hand are they really going to be making a slam try? I do agree West should probably have spade ace on the bidding but I've been fooled before by bad bidding.

[@ligafftheindifferent3495]

Dude, you don't have your AARP card. What are you doing playing bridge. :-)

[@BridginWithKai]

At age 14, I knew Bridge was my love even though I had no clue that was going on at the table. I enjoy Bridge very much and I plan to grow it so the supermajority of Bridge players don't have an AARP card! :)

[@ligafftheindifferent3495]

5H looks reasonable. When I see all 4 hands, it looks like they bid like idiots. If their bidding is more rational, your dummy would have been more suitable. The diamond position if VERY lucky for them. They are also lucky the Ts and 9s contribute a full trick to their cause.

[@TravisCrump-hy4ke]

Really shows why -500 vs -600 is such a bad sacrifice. You gained 2 IMPs if they were making and lost 14 if they went down. They'd need to make 87.5% of the time to break even. Finessing twice in diamonds looks correct or at the very least reasonable. A !ot of layouts where 5m is just hopeless, unusual for partner to have four card support and not raise so two hearts might even cash.

[@sashacooper9326]

3 imp gain

[@Lunaire.-]

You forgot sometimes you only go down 1 or 2

[@peterjackson2666]

You said it was at IMPs, so you gain only 100 points if they bid and make game, and lose 350 or more points if they don't. Better to defend. It's a closer decision at match points.

[@victorfinberg8595]

no, it isn't CERTAIN that R has AD. you could bet your house on it, but not your life

[@BridginWithKai]

Fair LOL

[@kennethgee2004]

so here i think you missed a preemptive bid. you had 6 hearts and with strength. your partner already passed, so you are only bidding to now to stop the opponents. the preemptive bid keeps them from communicating. 2 hearts was your bid which would have kept opponent from bidding 2 hearts as a limit raise. You could have gone 3 hearts but for that you usually need 7 but you had strength from partner you should have gotten 4 hearts as they have 4 hearts fitting your long run. pass and with opponent not having any information they would have had to figure out that they had game in minor. But looking 5 c is stoppable as you have 3 tricks with ace hearts and king of diamonds and spades best possible them set one trick but no game. so in all you lost 400 points for no real reason, but you reasoning on the K spades play was correct.

[@kennethgee2004]

if the hand played out exactly as it did but at 4 hearts you are only down 2 which is still an ouch. And if you did 2 hearts preempt and your partner 3 hearts then it would have need harder for your opponents to talk. You ight have gotten 3 heart bid and only be down 1 with no double. so only -100 versus -500 you actually lost versus 500 the opponents would have gained for game.

[@mjj29]

They have too many points to start on 2H, that's a good way to miss your own games

[@kennethgee2004]

@@mjj29 but it is a preemptive bid they do not get enough information to try for 5c. if you miss 2H then as not vulenerable you are set what 200 points instead of the -500 he took. would you like to go down on 2H or 5H as was the bid?

[@mjj29]

@@kennethgee2004 but imagine the situation where west's points are with north. They might have not enough points to raise you to game, thinking you have 6-9, even if it makes. Or they might sacrifice over a non-making game thinking you can't have the points to set them. It's not yet clear who has the contract, and so who should be preempting. I think it's more interesting if west opens as I said they should in my other comment, since that pins partner with fewer points

[@kennethgee2004]

@@mjj29 well let us not imagine, we have the hand here, so bid as shown. The preempt is not forcing, so if partner says nothing and the opponents do not know anything except you have 6 hearts, then they are at a loss as how to bid. They have no information yet and now they have to start at a 3 level to gather information, which is not a great position. If opponents stay silent you make the partial hearts with 8 tricks. This is the whole point to preemptive bid. You bid that even with no strength in hand as having 6 of one suit is large percentage. You will have to be short in at least one suit with either 3 2 2 giving you two doubletons or 3 3 1 giving you a singleton. if you force 6 rounds of hearts there is no way that opponents stay in the trump as you have 6. you have 3 winners then even with a weak hand. Having any 1 honor in the trump suit then gives you 4 tricks you just need to find 4 more usually in the form of ruffs. This is the nature of preemptive bids. I understand if some people do not like them as they discourage play and can be hard to save, but it is better to be set for partial game than set game in hearts as what happened. And there is the added benefit that your opponent is not playing game. It looks from hand that you could set the 5C but it would be hard. So you hit opponent for -100 maybe -200 if vulnerable or you go down -200 for missing 2H. Still better than -500 they went down.

[@paulmaier6305]

just bid 4H over 1d

[@mjj29]

My worry here is that you have 0 tricks from partner and no way to take the spade finesse. You know P can't have both spade honours as they have at most 5 on the count. Even if they have AS, there's a reasonable chance on this auction that you set them, and your best result is -3, which is good at favourable, but not that good at imps. Your worst case is -5. However, i think you missed an option earlier. Why pass over 3D? 3H might float undoubled. You could even bid 4H which is likely to win the auction although might be doubled, its better than 5. I'm also suspicious of east's bidding here. Surely 3C is better than 3D? That would have made me think the double minor fit less likely and therefore that 5C isn't making

[@mjj29]

I should say though, very well played, good save in the end

[@mjj29]

Looked back at the full hand again, west passing the opening is also crazy. That hand is worth 14 or 15. East opening 1D is also insane unless they are playing precision I guess? Maybe that's why W also couldn't open. It explains why they could only introduce their second suit at the 4 level, a crazy attempt to make up for all the misbids earlier, because they're turning down a part score for a very dodgy game

[@michaelhaas1661]

5H is horrendous in my opinion. If you wanted to encourage a sacrifice, you could've bid 3H the first time. Additionally, even opposite a hand where partner has 4 trumps, a real rarity after the pass of 2H, it's still a poor sac at best, as you went for 500 when the opponents are supposed to go down in 5C, since the normal line in diamonds is certainly to play north for K10x or K10xx, not south for 10x. Even if they do play diamonds wrong and make it, you're gaining 3 imps. If they went down, as they should, you lose 11. Even that assumed that partner had 4 trumps and only 1 side honour. If partner has a more normal hand, even one like Qxxx xx Kxx xxxx, that fits your hand well, 5H is almost 100% down 1-2 and 5C is probably dead on arrival to major suit losers. But what if the opponents have shotnesses to avoid major suit losers you say! On the well fitting example provided above, if the opponents have the fitting singletons that might allow 5C to make (although with only 8 trumps between them it's touch and go) they are now going spade ace, ruff, diamond through, ruff, diamond through, ruff, club ace, which puts you down around 4 when 5 clubs probably does not make if diamonds don't work out for them or partner can overruff anything. TLDR: thanks for bringing bridge to youtube, I enjoyed the video, but please make this bid when I'm playing against you, as it sets IMPs on fire at record pace.