Contract Bridge

There are some deals where declarer can force the defenders to reveal their distribution, and then use what he has learned to his advantage.

Here is a case in point. South got to seven spades as shown, and West led the queen of clubs. Declarer saw at once that the grand slam was a certainty unless he lost a heart trick. Since this could happen only if the opposing hearts were not divided 3-2, South decided to take whatever measures he could to guard against a 4-1 or 5-0 heart division.

Accordingly, he won the club lead with the ace, cashed dummy’s ace of diamonds, ruffed a diamond, returned to dummy with a trump and ruffed another diamond. When West showed out, South learned that East originally held seven diamonds.

Declarer then played two more rounds of trump, learning that East had started with precisely one spade. And when South next cashed the king of clubs, East failed to follow suit. As a result, East’s original distribution became an open book. He had started with seven diamonds, one spade and one club, so it followed that he had exactly four hearts.

All South had to do now was to take advantage of the clues he had so diligently accumulated. He led a low heart to the king and a low heart back. When East produced the eight, South finessed the nine and so made the grand slam.

Observe that it would not have helped East to play the ten instead of the eight on the second round of hearts, as South would simply win with the queen, ruff a club in dummy and then take the proven heart finesse.