Robot Squeeze

BBO robots are bad in a way that humans generally are not. If a human player has a choice of irrelevant spot cards, he tends to play the lowest. Someone, once upon a time, decided that it would be far trickier for robots to play their highest irrelevant spot card, because humans might not remember if their cards are high or not. This sometimes works, but more often it produces ludicrous results.

Playing a BBO star challenge, I become declarer on a simple auction.

	4 A654 Q52 AJ842

	AJ762 KJ109 63 KQ

Dummy	Me
Pass	1
1NT	2
4	Pass

The opening lead is the

K-2-4-6. The robots do not normally signal, but here they tend to give standard count. Sometimes. Maybe half the time? In any case, LHRO shifts to the

8, low, queen, and I win.

I now have ten tops, assuming clubs come home. I can always create 11 by ruffing a spade. As long as trumps are 3-2, which seems likely (LHRO might shift to a stiff trump, but RHRO would not put up the queen), I have 11 tops, so I'm going to play for 12. I draw a second round of trumps, and both follow. It's now safe to play a third round. RHRO pitches the 7. I cash the K, and RHRO contributes the 9. On the Q, LHRO plays the 10, so it is safe to overtake. Clubs turn out to be 2-4, and this ending eventuates:

	4 A Q5 8

	AJ7 9 3 —

If LHRO has both the

KQ and the expected

A, he's in trouble. I cash the last club, pitching a diamond, and LHRO pitches a spade. There are four spades and four diamonds left, so I cash the

A and ruff a spade. LHRO had all the cards, so my hand is now good.

In the ending, LHRO had no good option.

	4 A Q5 8
KQ5 — AJ —		109 — 1098 —
	AJ7 9 3 —

I would not have managed this without the helpful play of the "irrelevant"

9 on the first round of clubs.