ACES ON BRIDGE

In today’s deal, East was contemplating backing in with a two-suited call. However, once North-South had shown the balance of power, the vulnerability persuaded East to stay quiet and not tip off the distribution.

In four hearts, South received the diamond king lead to dummy’s ace, East encouraging with the seven. When the bad trump break was revealed, the diamond layout could also be inferred, given East’s signal to trick one.

At the table, South saw no better line than simply continuing trumps, knocking out West’s heart queen. Alas for him, East gained the lead in spades, cashed the diamond queen and delivered a diamond ruff.

Instead, declarer should have attempted to get rid of his spade. He should cash the club queen at trick three, then lead a club to the ace. A heart back to the king is followed by another club. Declarer then throws his losing spade on the fourth club. With clubs splitting evenly, the game will come home even if West has another diamond to reach his partner, since the diamond ruff comes with the natural trump trick.

The recommended line does not endanger the contract when West has short clubs and the spade ace. If he ruffs the third club, declarer may be able to set up the spade king and eventually reach dummy to take two diamond discards on the black-suit winners. And if West has the long club, pitching the spade on the fourth club effectively cuts the defenders’ communications when diamonds are 6-1.

ANSWER: Bid two hearts. Do not bother mentioning the spades when you have four-card support for partner’s major. A call of three hearts would be too much with questionable values in the pointed suits, and four hearts is a wild overbid — there is no need to over-preempt when you have the spade suit. Settle for the value raise.