ACES ON BRIDGE

In memory of a politician who died in the 1984 hotel bombing in Brighton, England, the award for the best-played hand in the match between the House of Lords and the House of Commons is named the Tony Berry Trophy. Today’s deal won the award for Tony McWalter of the Commons team in 2015.

Every North-South ended in the notrump game here. At McWalter’s table, West led the fourth-highest spade six to East’s jack, and the crucial moment had already been reached. From a single-dummy perspective, had declarer won the spade king, he would have little chance of running eight more tricks.The defenders would have been able to grab the diamond king and four more spade tricks on the known 5-2 break. The lucky diamond position allows the game to come home if declarer overtakes the heart king and runs the diamond queen, but declarer need not rely on such fortune.

If declarer could only cut the defensive communications in spades, then as long as he found the diamond king in the East hand, he could gain entry to the long hearts and score up nine tricks — five hearts and two in each minor.

McWalter duly ducked the spade jack, and the defense had no counter. West won the next spade and shifted to a heart, but declarer won and played a low diamond. After that, he was able to force his way into dummy to cash out the hearts. If West had switched to a diamond instead, declarer had planned to play small from dummy, win the ace, unblock the heart king and play a second diamond.

ANSWER: By all means, open light third in hand when you have a good suit and some shape. This is especially so when you have spade length. By opening one spade, you stand to push the opponents around if you catch a fit. At some vulnerabilities, you might flirt with the idea of preempting to two spades.