BRIDGE MASTERCLASS
YOu are South, declarer in 4 ♥ against which West leads the ♦ Q. Plan the play. THIS is quite a hard one, because all your instincts will tell you to win with the ♦ A and return to your own hand via a trump in order to lead towards the ♠ K.
But if you do, and east is able to win with the ♠ A, he will spot what you are up to and return a trump.
That will be two trumps gone from dummy, and the opposition will knock out the third when you lose the second spade — and it isn’t difficult to spot that you must get in a spade ruff to make your tenth trick.
The answer is to win the opening lead in dummy and immediately lead a low spade. now you have the tempo, and the defence hasn’t time to draw three rounds of trumps before you are ready for your spade ruff.