BRIDGE JACK STOCKEN

North thought long and hard over the virtues of making a take-out double or bidding 3NT over the 3♣ pre-empt. In the end, as the club stopper was too thin, he opted for double and his partner jumped to 4♠ ,as3 ♠ could have promised no points at all. At least North’s spades were the queen-ten, useful honour cards.

If South had had 4 – 4 in the majors then she would have bid 4♣, a cue bid asking partner to bid their longest major suit.

West led the four of diamonds against 4♠ and declarer remembered that when the pre-emptor does not lead their own suit then the lead of another suit is normally a singleton; 7321 shape is far more common than a 7322 shape.

Declarer won in dummy with the ace of diamonds and played the queen of spades, won by West with the ace. West switched to the ten of hearts trying to find partner’s entry to get a diamond ruff.

This ran to declarer’s jack,

East realising there was no point wasting the king; in fact, of course, as declarer and dummy had both the nine and eight of hearts, declarer can always pick up all four heart tricks because of the ten of hearts being doubleton. West’s lead of the ten of hearts though, made it simple for declarer.

It was clear to declarer that

West was trying to get her partner in to lead a diamond for a ruff, so trumps must be splitting no worse than 4 – 2.

So, rather than play a spade to dummy’s ten and risk coming back to hand with a heart, West might be ruffing that too, declarer played trumps from hand, starting with the king of spades.

When the trumps broke 3 – 3, declarer returned to dummy with the king of diamonds and played the queen of hearts, king from East and won in hand with the ace. 4♠ made plus one, just losing the ace of spades and a club.

The other table played in 3NT which had no chance after the club lead.