Signalling II

Another frequent cause of a signal costing a trick is for a defender to give up too valuable a card, in effect saying, Partner, I had a lovely holding here until I gave this signal to tell you what a lovely holding I had. I've seen this often. The computer (on the program I use) is geared to this, for some reason. But I've seen it a-plenty in real life. The first case comes from personal obsevation, the second from an OKbridge hand:

A 8 7 3
Q 6 K J 9 2
10 5 4

This was the diamond suit in a 3 no contract. West got the lead back after a few tricks, and deciding that the only path to defeating the contract must lie in diamonds, and so banged down the queen. Declarer ducked, and East signalled her pleasure with the 9. West naturally continued the suit and declarer ducked again, East winning with the jack. But she couldn't continue the suit without giving up a trick in it, and so shifted to another suit that allowed declarer his contract.
"I was thrown in," East wailed. Indeed, she was thrown in and didn't have an exit that didn't cost a trick. But she was thrown in because she squandered the 9. Her partner had discovered the suit. Further, when declarer ducks, East knows what West has yet to find out, namely that the queen is going to hold. West doesn't need a signal if his queen holds. Whatever declarer may hold in the closed hand, he's certainly not looking at K J and almost certainly feels some vulnerability in the suit. You don't hafta hit your partner over the head, particularly if it would take potentially valuable card to express your come-on. You will note that if East had retained the 9 and trusted her partner to have enough sense to continue the suit, she could then smother the 10 if declarer ducked a second time, and have the 9 sitting over the 8,

Here is one from OKbridge, which I also have with the series on 4-card suits (and not so incidentally, the above layout is another illustration of the mishandling of 4-card suits. Those 9's will do you in if you're contemptuous of their potential!).
J 8 5
K Q 5
K J
J 8 5 4 2
Q 9 6 4 K 7
J 7 6 10 9 3 2
Q 9 8 7 5 3 2
10 5 K Q 9 6
A 10 3 2
A 8 4
A 10 6 5
A 7

I played this hand in three no, making four, which I took to be about as good as anyone could do, though not better than the majority of the field. But when I went back to look over the scoring, I found one person had made 5 on the hand! Five? How do you get beyond one club and 3 in each of the other suits? Well, this is how:
This declarer got the same opening lead I guess the majority of us got, namely a low spade. The king drew the ace. At that point I went to the jack of diamonds, but this particular declarer got aggressive with spades himself, finessing the 8 at trick two, and then leading the jack so as to establish the 10. He didn't get any more spade tricks than I got, but what he did get was the 9 of clubs signal from East on the third round of spades.
West won the trick and dutifully set out to attack clubs, leading the 10, which was covered in turn with the jack, queen and won by the ace. And do you see what happened to that club suit? With 4 of the top six cards, the defense has now spent 3 of those cards and didn't win a trick in so doing. There is now only one club above the 8, which declarer proceeded to knock out with the 7. And that's how this declarer made 11 tricks on the hand. He gets four clubs, three spades, three hearts . . . well, he can't get two diamonds, since that makes 12, and he's lost 2 tricks, but you get the point.
The nine was doubly foolish and wasteful, first because it's a right nice card when the honors are floating around all four hands, and secondly because (as discussed under Four-Card suits), you don't want to cut your holding down to less than declarer's if you can help it. Here, East was dealt one less club than dummy, but that's not reason for getting down to 3 to dummy's five. If anything, that's more reason for hanging onto your length.

Here's one more case from OKbridge, only here East was only singly foolish, since he was following suit:

Q 7 4
10 9 K J 8 3
A 6 5 2

Opening lead, the 10 of spades. Two defenders that I know of signalled with the 8. Whether declarer ducks or takes an expected continuation, this allows declarer to give up a trick to both the king and jack, but to control the fourth round with the six! The 8 is just too valuable a card to part with. And on top of that, West doesn't need to know you have some good stuff in that suit. If the 10 holds, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to know that a continuation is called for, and if declarer wins this first trick, he's going to have to deal with spades in the fullness of time.
How do we know an 8 or 9 is going to be valuable, since of course they often are not? Well, of course you don't know. But I would say that if in doubt, and particularly if you can see that several honors are going on one trick, then you'd do well to hang onto your 8's and 9's and place some trust in your partner. It doesn't matter if two honors both come from declarer's hand or both from your side, or one from each side (as you conquer the queen). If two honors and even three are spent on one trick, that can promote the 8 or 9 in a hurry.