Goren on Bridge

South jumped to three hearts to show a maximum with four-card heart support. North was happy to carry on to game.

South won the opening club lead with his ace as East contributed the 10 of clubs. When partner leads a high card and there’s a singleton in dummy, partner won’t usually care about your attitude or your count in that suit. Third-hand play is then a suit-preference signal, showing strength in either the higher ranking or the lower ranking of the two remaining suits, excluding the trump suit. South won with his ace and led the queen of hearts. West stepped up smartly with his ace and shifted to a spade, the higher of the two remaining suits. West might well have shifted to a diamond had East not played the 10 of clubs at trick one.

Dummy’s queen of spades lost to the king, and East shifted to a diamond. There was nothing South could do to avoid the loss of two diamond tricks and he drifted down one after an excellent defense.

Note how important it was for West to take his ace of hearts right away. Had he ducked, South would have taken the spade finesse. When that lost and a diamond came back, South could rise with his ace and then easily eliminate both black suits by ruffing a club, cashing the ace of spades and ruffing a spade, then ruffing his last club. Another trump would then put West on play with a choice of yielding a ruff-sluff or giving South the queen of diamonds.