ACES ON BRIDGE

With his depth and his shallows, his good and his evil, All in all he’s a problem must puzzle the devil.

— Robbie Burns

The Blue Ribbon Pairs is one the strongest pairs games in America, but surprisingly few pairs landed this ticklish slam.

As South in six no-trump, you win the heart lead in hand.The best line seems to be to take the diamond ace-king early, delaying the play on clubs. When you learn the bad news in diamonds, you can cash a top heart in hand and take three spade tricks. Once East turns up with nine cards in spades and diamonds, give up on the club finesse. Instead, play for West to be squeezed. (That would be even clearer if West had preempted.)

When you lead the last spade, West pitches a club painlessly enough. Throw dummy’s diamond 10 and cross to the diamond queen, squeezing West even though his hearts are irrelevant in a sense. If West pitches a heart, you take the heart ace and then lead a low club, covering East’s card; West is endplayed to return a club into your tenace. If West pitches a club instead, play the club ace and another club before cashing the heart ace, and dummy is high.

Zia Mahmood played the hand this way to make. However, going down one scored only a little below average, as the original reporter of this deal discovered.

Why did that player go down? At his table, East opened one diamond! South doubled (yes, he could have bid one notrump), and West leaped to three clubs preemptively. Can you blame North for bidding six no-trump? East led his club of course, and now declarer had no chance.

ANSWER: Bid three diamonds. Assuming that you play inverted minor raises, so that this is a weak bid, you should up the ante, making it more difficult for the opponents to come in. Bid to the limit when you have a big fit. Bridge is rapidly changing from a game where you sit back and let the opponents bid their good hands; instead, preempt when you can. Bidding is more fun than passing.

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