ACES ON BRIDGE

In war there is no second prize for the runner-up. — General Omar Bradley When North jumped to four diamonds, systematically showing a balanced slam try in support of hearts, South rejected the try. But after he showed only one key-card, his partner next made a slightly optimistic grand slam try, promising all the key-cards. With all the kings and a little extra shape, South decided he had enough to go for the brass ring. West had a suitably passive lead against seven hearts in the form of the diamond 10. Declarer needed to decide which would be the master hand, and in which hand he would take ruffs. Sensibly, he decided to take ruffs in dummy, so he won the diamond ace and carefully drew two rounds of trumps with dummy’s high hearts. When the heart acejack revealed the bad break, South understood that it might be difficult to take the one ruff he needed in dummy. But he found the best line when he cashed the club ace- queen. He then crossed back to hand by leading a spade to the king, pitched dummy’s remaining diamond on the club king, and ruffed a diamond in dummy. He could next lead a heart to his hand, draw the last trump, and claim the rest. Players tend to assume that any line that needs two favorable breaks will generally require more luck than a line that needs just one. But here declarer played a line that needed very little from both minor suits (East having at least three clubs and two diamonds) as opposed to East having three or more diamonds. South’s chance of losing to a ruff on his chosen line was relatively small by comparison to the risk of encountering a 5-2 diamond break. ANSWER: Yes, you could try to land on a pin-head by passing. But it seems like an acceptable risk to get too high in the attempt to find a fit. I would use Stayman, though with all these assets in the short suits, I can imagine that simply raising to three notrump might be the winning strategy.