Bridge

Opening lead — four of spades.

In many hands that appear to depend on the success of a finesse — ordinarily a 50-50 proposition — declarer may be able to increase his chances by adopting a different method of play that avoids or at least delays the finesse. For example, he may establish a side suit or devise an endplay, and in so doing raise his chances of making the contract to better than 50% and possibly as high as 100%.

The same general idea applies to cases where a favourable suit break is involved. In today’s deal, let’s say East wins the spade lead with the queen and continues with the ace, which South ruffs. If South then draws two rounds of trump and plays the ace and another club, hoping for a 2-2 split, he goes down.

But this would be the wrong way to pay the hand. What he should do after ruffing the spade is lead a heart to the eight, ruff a diamond, cross to the king of hearts, cash the ace of diamonds and ruff dummy’s last diamond.

With all the spades and diamonds eliminated from dummy, South now leads a low club and plays low after West produces the queen. West is then forced to return a diamond or a spade, allowing South to discard a club from dummy while he ruffs in his hand and so make the contract.

East cannot save his partner by overtaking the queen of clubs with the king, since he would have to return a spade or a club, either of which also hands declarer the contract.

This method of play caters not only to the clubs being 2-2, but also to a 3-1 division with West holding a singleton honour. Similarly, if West should happen to follow low to the first club lead, the nine would then be played from dummy, endplaying East if he started with a singleton club honour.