ACES ON BRIDGE

In today’s deal, North set up a game force and then jumped to four clubs to initiate a slam-going sequence. When he found out that his partner controlled the spades, he took a shot at the club slam.

East won the diamond lead and switched to a spade. Declarer won with the ace. He hoped to ruff two hearts in hand, but he could draw two rounds of trumps before he did so. It seemed better to keep both the queen and jack of clubs in hand in case he needed to ruff high twice, and so he cashed the club ace-king next. Then came the top hearts, followed by a heart ruff as East pitched a diamond. Declarer then ruffed a diamond and another heart as East shed his final diamond. Dummy was high now, so not even the diamond king was needed. Declarer’s only remaining task was to reach dummy with a low ruff to draw the final trump, but how to do that?

South cashed the top spades next. When East dropped the spade queen on the second round,

South assumed East had been dealt a 2=2=6=3 shape. He confidently ruffed his diamond king low — disaster! That allowed East an overruff for the setting trick.

That was superb defense by East. He had needed to pitch diamonds; otherwise, declarer would infer from West’s silence that it was safe to ruff the third diamond to dummy, and the spade queen would give declarer that extra nudge in the right direction.

It is likely that declarer would have ruffed a spade to dummy if East had not sacrificed his spade queen.

BID WITH THE ACES

ANSWER: Your powerful two-suiter justifies a strong move. Bid four clubs, by agreement a variety of Michaels known as Leaping Michaels. This sequence shows a game-forcing hand with clubs and hearts. Without that option, you would have to cue-bid spades to show a two-suiter with hearts and a minor.