Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
ACES ON BRIDGE
SOUTH ; A5 k K6 l AJ9852 ' KQ3 Vulnerable: Neither Dealer: South The bidding: South West North East 1 l Pass 1 k Pass 2 NT Pass 3 NT All pass Opening Lead: Spade seven
Ask where’s the North? At York, ‘tis on the Tweed; In Scotland at the Orcades; and there; At Greenland, Zembla or the lord knows where.
— Alexander Pope
The most successful performance by a foreign pair at the 2000 Spring Nationals was by Peter Fredin and Magnus Lindkvist, two strong players who crept into the event somewhat unnoticed, and extremely late! Their flights from Sweden were delayed by 24 hours, but they still got to play in the Vanderbilt and reached the last eight, helped by plays like this.
Lindkvist led the spade seven (thirdand fifth-best) against the no-trump game. When declarer played low from dummy, Fredin carefully followed small. Declarer took his ace, and next came the club king-queen. Fredin could see that if he let this hold, declarer might turn his attention to hearts and set up dummy’s heart eight. So, Fredin took the second club and led the spade 10, trying to disguise the blockage.
The plan worked well; declarer duly ducked.
Now Fredin shifted to a low diamond. Declarer put in the eight, and Lindkvist won his queen to play a third spade, driving out dummy’s ace and setting up the fifth winner for the defense in time.
Note that if Fredin plays the spade 10 at trick one, the defense is much tougher. Fredin cannot attack spades again from his side, and the chances that declarer will build a ninth trick one way or another are dramatically increased. In fact, South can always succeed at double-dummy by taking the second spade and working on hearts. The spade blockage and favorable diamond layout are too much for the defense to cope with.
ANSWER: You have the perfect shape for a negative double. Do not worry about the lack of high cards — your club support makes up for that. You may not be delighted if the auction continues with your partner passing for penalties, but he is unlikely to do so without a strong fourcard holding.