Controlling the losses

Facing a couple of Austrians in a team game, I came across the following collection, red vs white:

KQT8xxxx
xxx
Ax
-

LHO opened 2H (weak) as dealer and RHO responded 2NT, forcing. What would you do?

I think most would bid 4S, but I'm very hesitant these days to be aggressive in 4th position after both opp's has gotten a bid in there. The odds for getting good dummies or pressuring opp's into overbidding has seriously decreased. I repeat: seriously decreased. It has finally hit me how much, after spending a considerate amount of time looking through these auctions (actions).

This time though, I probably should have bid 4S anyway. I settled for 3S. I was vulnerable against not and not having doubled 2NT, partner should expect more playing tricks than honor strength. The next hand bid 4H and partner was on the spot with:

9
Tx
A9xx
KQJTxx

I think double is the correct call, but maybe I'm just influenced by what was right this time. I try to look at each call objectively when analysing an auction, post-mortem, but it's not always easy to do that. At some subconscious level, there is always the risk of a biased view. I'm not sure what I would have done over a double. 4S looks a bit tempting, doesn't it?

Anyway, partner hoped for a different kind of hand with me; at this vuln, the 2NT call may have been a semi-psyche with a prime fit and I could easily have had a stiff H. He tried 5C, immediately X-ed, I retreated to 5S and the inevitable X followed.

K of heart lead. This did not look good.

9
Tx
A9xx
KQJTxx

KQT8xxxx
xxx
Kx
-

As always, it's not over til' it's over. RHO fell for the old 'play to fast' trap. Sensing blood, he quickly overtook with the ace and shifted to a low spade. Where would we be if our opponents, even the competent ones, played well all the time?

I ducked in hand (with no expectency of a 2nd spade trick, i.e a spade holding without the J, East would have just cashed the ace) winning in dummy as West discarded. The extra entry meant that I could setup club tricks with the ace of diamonds as re-entry to discard hearts and got out for -200. This proved to be a push when the other table played 4S X.

Stop to think both when things look good and when things look bad. Every trick makes a difference. (Sometimes even obvious things need to repeated out loud! ;-)