Strip & End Play


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A 4
A K Q 10 2
A 7 5
A K 2
K Q J 9 7 3 10 8 6
4 3 J
Q 9 4 10 8 6
J 3 Q 10 8 7 6 4
5 2
9 8 7 6 5
K J 3 2 Opening lead: K of spades
9 5 Contract: 6 hearts

In the classic strip and endplay, you strip the opponents of all convenient exit cards so that with trump in each hand, the defender who wins a trick you throw them must either give a sluff and ruff or a free finesse. It's a common opportunity when you're loaded for bear in trump. If you have a finesse, particularly a two-way, you'll want to give thought to stripping the opponents and forcing them to solve the riddle of the hand for you.
But you're not always going to get the classic case where you can do all the stripping you'd like, or be able to live with either opponent capturing the trick you throw them. Still, even with a partial strip, or with money in the bank if West gets the lead, not so if East does, it might pay you to do all the stripping you can and throw 'em that trick.
Such as the case with the hand above. We can see that if the opponents are on their toes East can get the lead on the second round of spades and shoot a diamond through the closed hand. Down one. But will they be on their toes? West led the K. The suit might block. Or if you lead through East, that defender might not think of hopping up with the 10 and West may have thrown his lower two spots. Indeed, in the two printouts I have, one declarer making, the other not, West did sluff his lower two spots when it came time to sluff.
As for the declarer who made the hand, the strange thing is that -- whoa, you won't believe this -- when declarer had stripped the hand and led the five from the closed hand, West went up with the Q even though he held the nine and only a mere 4 was showing in dummy. But I decided to see if East still had the 10 and found he'd discarded ALL his spades on the second and third rounds of trump! I don't know why anyone would even want to keep that motley collection of clubs, or in any event, more than two guards to the Q, while quickly getting rid of some cards that might help his partner. So West can hardly be faulted for playing the Q, since the Q and 9 were equals at that point. And declarer had his contract.
As for the othet declarer, he actually cashed the A K of diamonds, eschewing the finesse, early in the hand. So he didn't give himself much of a play for the hand, not even taking a natural finesse. Further, when he led the last club, instead of ruffing and then leading a spade, he sluffed his spade loser in the closed hand and let the defense have the trick while they still had a spade exit even if the suit had been blocked.
In any event, you can see that even an imperfect strip and endplay just might work under certain circumstances against some defenders, and further that there's really no downside to giving the play a chance, for at worst, you'll strip, East wins your spade lead and leads a diamond. So you take the finesse on East's lead, the same as you might on your own. Oh, yes, you might miss an overtrick if the diamond hook is on and the suit splits 3-3. Yeah, Mazel Tov. You'd better give your (slam) contract the best possible chance before you start thinking about overtricks.

Whoa! I didn't realize I had two more printouts until I turned my sheet over. The third declarer and defenders did exactly as postulated above. Declarer took the opening lead, two rounds of trump, two rounds of clubs, and ruffed a club, then took a third round of trump so as to lead a spade from dummy. You want to lead from dummy because you want West to take the trick (willy-nilly). So you hope that East lazily goes second hand low and that West cannot help winning the trick. And that's exactly what happened. This West sluffed the 7 of spades on the third round of clubs and then the 3 of spades on the third round of trump and East lazily played his lowest spade on the lead from dummy and yes, yes, yes, West had to win the trick. Well done, declarer. Not so well done, defenders.
And the fourth declarer also played the hand very well. He too took a 3rd round of hearts, inducing a costly discard from West. He didn't do it to change the lead, for he used the A of diamonds for that. This East also lazily went second hand low on the spade lead from dummy, and this West's lowest spade was the 9, and he too took the trick willy-nilly and declarer had his contract.
I'm afraid I didn't jot down how many made, how many went down, but I do have printouts showing that at least 3 declarers made out like bandits by stripping the hand and then leading the suit past the defender you don't want to take the trick. So even imperfect strip & endplays can have happy endings for declarer.