ACES ON BRIDGE

Here is another hand where a defender has to try to steer declarer onto the wrong course.

North-South reach an aggressive but playable slam, the fitting black-suit honors and absence of diamond wastage being critical here. West kicks off with a trump, trying to protect his red-suit honors, and declarer sees that two ruffs in either hand will secure the slam. He takes the trump in hand and gives up a diamond, West winning to continue trumps.

Upon discovering the 4-1 spade split, declarer cannot hope to take two heart ruffs in hand without establishing West’s spade nine.

He must instead play to ruff diamonds rather than simply using the suit for transportation. He ruffs a diamond, crosses to the club jack, ruffs another diamond, cashes the club ace and overtakes the club queen. When West follows, he can draw the last trump and enjoy the long clubs. However, West can try to throw a wrench in the works by falsecarding with the club 10 or club nine on the first round. This gives declarer an attractive losing option — to overtake the club queen on the second round of the suit, then jettison dummy’s club ace on the trump. This would be the winning line if West had 10-nine doubleton in clubs, after all.

If declarer follows that line on the layout shown, he will block the suit and lose the long clubs. He may still get it right, but West has nothing to lose by giving his opponent a headache.

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— James Harvey Robinson