There are three chances, spade to J, spade to K or duck a
club and hope they split 3-3.
The club split is 36%, either spade play is 50%. However I
seriously considered ducking a club.
West wins and returns a diamond, but now I cash 4 heart winners and West
could be in trouble with all sort of 3-1-5-4 distributions and even 4-1-4-4, so
it’s not just a 36% chance. However I
couldn’t quantify it, you can’t sit forever at the table thinking what to
do. So I just played a spade to the J
which was the only losing option.
Playing at a Congress against unknown opponents made it
harder but I think I would duck the club against weaker opponents.
West, with a singleton heart is likely to have 4 clubs. Duck a club, win the diamond return and now
play 4 hearts. West has to find 4
discards between spades and diamonds.
With Qxx and say KJxxx they’ll almost certainly let a diamond go on
the KH, then maybe a spade on the next heart but what next? Of course with better players they know immediately that partner has AS (I can't have 10 points).
If they have Axx spades they can discard two spades, but then have to let two diamonds go.
With 4-1-4-4 hands they will still be in a bit of trouble and might even block the diamonds. Some players won't even like playing a diamond from say KJxx and you might get a passive club return giving you a better chance to sniff out the spade situation.
So even against better players ducking a club is better than 36% and against weaker players I think it could be at least 60%.
However I later thought, what if I run all my hearts first? I can afford a diamond and a spade from Dummy. What will West's 4 discards be? They can't let a club go in case I have Jxx, they are clever if they find 3 spades and 1 diamond. I might misguess and duck a spade thinking they started Axxx or guess that they started with Qxx in clubs rather Jxxxx to explain no club discard.
So better to run the hearts first but still a guess at the end.
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