CONTRACT BRIDGE

A CRUCIAL DECISION

The outcome of a contract frequently hinges on the play of one card. For this reason, when declarer is faced with a situation where his decision as to which card to play might make or break the contract, he should direct all his energies to solving that problem.

Consider this deal where West leads a heart against South’s three-notrump contract. East wins with the ace and returns the jack, and South must decide whether to play the nine or the queen. If he plays the queen, he goes down two; if he plays the nine, he makes the contract.

The question is how declarer can tell which play is correct. The answer is simple – if he is familiar with the Rule of Eleven. Declarer’s main problem is to work out East’s heart holding. If East started with four hearts, South makes the contract whatever he plays – all he loses is four heart tricks. If East started with A-J-X, South goes down whatever he does because the defence collects the first five tricks.

This leaves only two situations where declarer’s play makes any difference: the one where East has A-J doubleton (in which case South must duck to make the contract), and the one where East has A-J-10 tripleton (in which case South must cover to block the suit and thereby prevent it from being run).

By applying the Rule of Eleven, declarer knows (by subtracting six – the card led – from 11) that the North, East and South hands contain five cards higher than the six.

Since those five cards – dummy’s seven, declarer’s Q-9 and East’s A-J – are all accounted for at trick two, it follows that East could not have started with the A-J-10. Therefore, South’s only chance is to duck and hope East was dealt the A-J doubleton.