Contract Bridge

Two chances are certainly always better than one, and this is especially true at the bridge table. Consider this case from a national team-of-four championship, where both North-South pairs reached four spades as shown.

At the first table, declarer won West’s opening trump lead in his hand with the eight and led another spade to dummy’s ace. A diamond was then led to the king, losing to West’s ace.

West now effectively put an end to declarer’s chances by returning his remaining trump to dummy’s queen, removing dummy’s last entry before the club suit could be untangled. South could now do no better than lead a heart to the king, but even though the ace was favorably placed, he still could not avoid losing two hearts and two diamonds for down one.

The declarer at the second table found a way to give himself an extra chance. He carefully won the opening trump lead with dummy’s ace and also led a diamond to the king. West won and continued with the queen and another diamond, ruffed by South (a trump return would not have fared any better).

Declarer now cashed the spade king, but then, leaving the last trump outstanding for the moment, played the A-K-Q of clubs. After both opponents followed to all three clubs, he crossed to the spade queen, discarded a heart on the club jack and led toward the king of hearts for his 10th trick.

Note that this second line of play had everything to gain and little to lose. By timing the play properly and handling his entries to dummy judiciously, South retained access to the jack of clubs when and if the necessity for its use arose. This gave him an additional chance to make the contract if one of the red aces was favorably placed and the key suits broke normally.