ACES ON BRIDGE

South had a tricky hand to bid after North’s preempt. Facing a fit in either major, game would surely be a good prospect. South therefore responded three spades, intending to follow up with a natural call of four hearts if North did not raise. As it was, North’s king-jack doubleton was decent support in context, and the spade game was reached. (Had one of North’s diamonds been a small spade, his hand would have been worth a fourheart cue-bid.)

West led his singleton heart to dummy’s queen, and declarer thought that 10 tricks would be a pianola if spades were not 5-0. Looking no further, he cashed the spade king and then called for the spade jack, running it when East discarded. West took the spade queen, cashed the diamond ace and led a club to East’s ace. Back came a heart for West to ruff, and the contract was sunk.

The combination of the bad trump break and vile heart split was undeniably unlucky, but South might have considered that the lead of a nine was consistent with shortness. Declarer would have done better to leave the spade king in dummy to overruff in hearts if needed. The best line is to run the spade jack at trick two, without cashing the king. West wins and can embark on the same line of defense as above, but then declarer will have the spade king to overruff West’s ruff of the second heart. He will then be able to return to hand with a ruff in one minor or the other, draw trumps and claim 10 tricks.

ANSWER: A Michaels cue-bid of two clubs, to show both majors, is reasonable because it gets both suits in at once. This is in spite of the extra length in the higher suit. If you do that, you should plan to act again by bidding spades over your partner’s preference to hearts to show the sixth spade and extras. With a six-card major and a minor, you might prefer to bid the major before the minor.