Bridge BALANCED HANDS NEED MORE CARE

If you go to musical concerts, who have you listened to the most often?

For me, it is Mary Chapin Carpenter. She is a wonderful songwriter and singer.

I have been to 13 of her concerts — and it would have been at least 14 if it weren’t for CO

VID-19. So, it seems appropriate to feature a grand slam deal. How should South try to win all 13 tricks in no-trump after West leads the club 10?

When you are bidding a slam with a balanced hand, be circumspect because losers tend to stay losers forever. With two balanced hands, go with the recommended point-count guidelines: 33-36 for a small slam and 37-plus for a grand (if the three missing points are not a king).

In this deal, South’s jump to three no-trump showed 25

27 points, North plunged into seven no-trump, because he and his partner had not met Super Gerber. (Then, a jump to five clubs would have asked for aces, and a subsequent six clubs for kings. Four clubs over three no-trump would have been Stayman.)

South started with four spades, three diamonds and two clubs, so he needed four heart tricks. The finesse had to be working. But declarer might have had to take that finesse three times. If so, he needed three dummy entries, which had to come from spades.

South cashed the spade queen and led his spade three to dummy’s king. When both opponents followed, declarer played a heart to his queen, overtook the spade jack with dummy’s ace and repeated the heart finesse. Finally, he led the spade four to dummy’s six and took the third heart finesse.