BRIDGE

This deal occurred during a match between Australia and Indonesia at the 1980 world team championship. With Tim Seres North and Dick Cummings South for Australia, the bidding went as shown.

West led the queen of diamonds. Cummings ruffed and played the ace of trumps at trick two, catching West’s 10. Realising that if the trumps were divided 3-2 there would be no problem scoring 10 tricks, Cummings decided to try to protect himself, if possible, against a 4-1 trump division. So at trick three he led the jack of hearts instead of a low heart. The jack play had the great advantage of establishing a possible trump coup position against East later in the play.

East won the jack with the queen and returned a spade, West’s jack forcing dummy’s ace. Cummings then ruffed a diamond to shorten his trump length and cashed the K-Q of spades, producing this position:

Cummings now led the club three to dummy’s ace, brilliantly demonstrating that finessing the queen would unnecessarily jeopardise a sure contract. (Give East the K-5 of clubs instead of the 9-5 and finessing the queen is fatal if East returns a club.)

Next came the 10 of spades from dummy. East could not gain by ruffing, so he, and declarer also, discarded a club. Cummings then ruffed the 10 of diamonds with the four of hearts, exited with the jack of clubs, and was sure to score a 10th trick with his 9-7 of trumps sitting behind East’s K-8.