ACES ON BRIDGE

All the deals this week come from last year’s Summer NABC in Toronto. This one cropped up in the Wernher Open Pairs. You’d expect three notrump by South to be the normal spot here, and on a heart lead, the defenders have no real prospect of more than four tricks when both red suits behave. Note, however, that on the first round of diamonds, declarer should lead a small card to his eight or 10, not his king. But a curious ending arose after a club lead. Declarer ducked, then won the second club. He now crossed to a spade to lead a low diamond to the 10, losing to the queen. He won the next club, pitching a heart from dummy, crossed to the spade king and advanced the diamond two, to the jack, king and ace. When West cashed a club, declarer had to be careful with his next discard from dummy, which now held two spades, two hearts and two diamonds. In order to maintain flexibility, South must discard a diamond from dummy — but it must specifically be the nine; otherwise, a heart to the king and ace cuts declarer’s communications. However, if you unblock dummy’s diamond nine, you can always arrange to test spades before falling back on the heart finesse. Note also that the defenders should have ducked the second diamond. Now if declarer plays a third diamond rather than testing spades, West can cash the club winner. South will then have to pitch a spade or a top heart from dummy before he knows which major is behaving.