ACES ON BRIDGE

The world’s prize stupid oaf is the man who thinks he already has all the answers. — John W. Campbell

Sitting South, you open one club and compete to three spades facing partner’s negative double. Partner bids one more for the road. How would you tackle four spades on the lead of the heart king?

You have a likely trump loser and perhaps as many as three diamond losers.You can pitch two diamonds from dummy on the clubs, but only after drawing trumps.You must not lose the lead to East in the process either, lest he switch to a high diamond and pick off your king.

After winning with the heart ace, you can lead a low spade and finesse the 10 when East follows low. This forces the jack from West, and back comes a club. What now?

If trumps are 3-2, the rest will be easy. You can simply draw trumps and ruff a heart at your leisure. If, however, spades are 4-1 and West began with queen-jackfourth, you must take your heart ruff before drawing all the trumps. Take the club ace right away and ruff a heart in hand. Be careful to ruff with the spade nine to unblock the suit.The spade ace comes next. When East shows out, you lead your spade six to dummy’s eight, taking the marked finesse, and then draw West’s last trump with the spade king, pitching a diamond loser of course, before running your clubs.You can gracefully concede the last two diamond tricks to West.

Paradoxically, perhaps, the preemptive raiser here is slightly more likely to be short in spades than the overcaller, even though the overcaller appears to have longer hearts than his partner.

ANSWER: Lead the club nine. There is no reason to go active with a dangerous pointed-suit attack. That could easily blow a trick. Put the ball into play with a safe club lead and leave the heroics for when you know more about the hand. My second choice would be a spade.