Contract Bridge

One of the best measures of a player’s skill is the ability to respond properly to an unusual set of circumstances. Consider this deal, which features opportunities for both the offense and the defense.

South reaches three notrump as shown. Let’s say he wins the spade lead with dummy’s queen and plays a club to the queen, which holds. Declarer then leads a low spade and, after West follows low, finesses the nine! This allows him to repeat the club finesse, West following to the jack with the ten.

South next leads the king of spades to the ace and leads a third club from dummy, this time finessing the nine. As a result of this series of plays, South makes exactly three notrump.

First, let’s take a look at the defense. West was guilty of a critical error at trick three when he played low on South’s five. He should have played the ten instead, which would have robbed dummy of the extra entry declarer needed to lead clubs three times from the North hand. Without that additional entry, South would have to go down one.

Now let’s examine the offense. South could have made the contract legitimately had he made an unusual play at trick one. Rather than take West’s jack of spades with the queen, he should have won with dummy’s ace and dropped the king on it!

After taking the first club finesse, South would next lead a low spade toward dummy’s Q- 9, finessing the nine if necessary and thus assuring the ability to take two more club finesses. West would have been helpless against this sequence of plays, and South would have scored nine untainted tricks.