ACES ON BRIDGE

“One of the pleasures of middle age is to find out that one WAS right, and that one was much righter than one knew at, say, 17 or 23.”

— Ezra Pound

As South, you hear your partner produce a jump raise of your one-spade response. You cue-bid four clubs to initiate a slam-going sequence, then make the practical jump to five spades after your partner cue-bids his diamond control.You would like to play a slam if he has a heart control, and this is the way to ask him.

Partner presses on to six spades, and West leads the club jack from his sequence. You can see a potential loser in each red suit. You will surely need the diamond finesse to work, but you may still have to deal with a possible third-round diamond loser. You should intend to pitch two of dummy’s diamonds on the clubs, but even then, you have dummy’s hearts to deal with. If you were to ruff them in hand, West might overruff, so it is better to look at this from the South hand’s perspective and try to establish the fourth diamond by ruffing out the opponents’ holdings in that suit. You will thus lose only one heart trick.

You must be careful with your entries. If you draw all the trumps, you will find yourself unable to finesse in diamonds and still ruff a diamond against accurate defense, since West will play small on the diamond queen.

Therefore, you should take the diamond finesse at trick two. When the diamond queen wins, draw two rounds of trumps with dummy’s top cards and then cash the diamond ace. Cross to hand with the third spade and throw dummy’s diamonds on the clubs. You can now ruff out the diamonds, with a trump entry back to hand to enjoy it.

ANSWER: his disposal. will West not Go have is passive a lots passed with of extra hand, a heart values so rather declarer at than risk giving away a spade trick on lead. Honor-fourth is by no means an attractive lead on a blind auction against no-trump. A sequence seems better, and going passive should avoid costing your side a trick. A fivecard suit would be a horse of a different color.