Bridge

Jovanka (Jovi as she is universally known in the bridge world) Smederevac, of Austria took heed of the late Terence Reese’s remark “Blind leads are for deaf players” on this hand from the 2018 North American Summer Nationals Von Zedtwitz Life Master Pairs, held in Atlanta. Jovi decided to attack in hearts and led the ace. Declarer’schoiceofThreeNo-Trumps rebid clarified her hand type. Declarer doesn’t have 18/19 balanced, because with that type of hand she would have agreed spades, or tried to figure out if partner had five hearts. Therefore 3NT must be based on long diamonds.

When Jade Barrett encouraged on the top heart lead, Jovi cashed the queen then led a low heart to East’s king, giving South a discard problem, and he settled on dropping the king of spades.

So East continued with the ace of spades, then led a low club, away from the ace. Declarer won, but was now locked in hand. She could cash her diamonds, which she did, but then had to play clubs from hand, ending two down – for a top to Jovi and Jade.