THE ACES ON BRIDGE

“I now delight in spite of the right And the might of classic tradition, In writing and reciting straight ahead, Without let or omission ...” -- Robert Graves .....................

For 20 years Patrick Jourdain, President of the International Bridge Press Association, presented problems in Bridge Magazine. Prior to that, he prepared problems for U.K. television. Now over 150 of these have been featured in book form -“Problem Corner,” published by Master Point Press of Canada. Here is one of my favorites.

Imagine South is in three no-trump and West leads the spade three. Since the club suit will need to supply four tricks, South assumes that West must hold the ace.

On winning the spade lead in hand, South plays a club to dummy’s king, which holds. One possible continuation is dummy’s low club, playing West for a holding of ace and just one other club. But if West has ace-third of clubs, this play won’t work. To cater for all eventualities, you need to reenter your hand to play another club toward dummy.

Should you return with a diamond, West will play the ace on the next club, blocking the suit. A spade return will then leave the clubs permanently entangled, with no re-entry to your hand. Instead, you just return to hand at trick three with the other top spade, strange as that may appear at first sight.

The spade lead suggests that spades are breaking 5-4, so the defenders will be able to cash at most three spade tricks. But apart from the club ace, those are all the tricks they will take. Any return can be won in dummy and the clubs unblocked -- with the diamond ace still in place as an entry to the clubs.