I was the one who committed what user 'wank' calls a capital offense of opening Multi with that hand. When my partner (abccba) bid 2
♥; my first thoughts were that I had committed a cardinal sin too, as usually partner would have cards in the other major when he makes a pass or correct bid & it looked like our
♠'s were lost for good. However, I began revising my initial thoughts about the hand when North (Kushari, a veteran grandmaster of Indian Bridge) overcalled 3
♦, South (laltu) bid 3NT, and my partner doubled. Partner must have something good in hand to double 3NT when he does not know, or care, what my major is. Partner, who is on lead against 3NT, is likely to have a solid suit or a semi-solid suit with a
♦ card that he plans to set up on the lead.
The double of 5
♦ only confirmed my thoughts that, since I could trust partner to not double 3NT if he did not have a defense to other game contracts, he must have a semi-solid suit with a
♦ card. As I mentioned earlier, he is likely to have very little in
♥ & since opps should have some
♠ to bid 3N & I've good
♠'s myself, that leaves only
♣ to be partners suit. Happy with my analysis (user 'wank' came closest to the "correct" reasoning among those who commented), I led a
♣ to discover this hand, where any lead but a
♣ would have sold the contract:
Oh well, that was a nice fairy tale, the truth alas was that I led a
♠ without much thought. In addition, I have to confess that I switched a couple of cards in the hand - partner had
♦A8 and the
♦KQ were with Kushari ji - who correctly judged at the table that 3NT would play horribly but a
♦ game may have chances. Hence, either a passive
♥ or
♣ lead could have worked on the actual hand & only my aggressive
♠ lead sold the contract.
Cheers, Krishna.
_________________
Valiant were the efforts of the declarer // to thwart the wiles of the defender // however, as the cards lay // the contract had no play // except through the eyes of a kibitzer.