Montreal Gazette

aces on bridge

- BOBBY WOLFF

“Battles nor songs can from oblivion save, But Fame upon a white deed loves to build.” -- Lizette Reese

In today’s deal from last year’s Yeh Cup in Wuxi, China, three hearts looks to be high enough. But Agustin Madala bid game and received a diamond lead to East’s king, a spade shift to West’s ace, and a second diamond. He rose with dummy’s ace, pitched his diamond loser on a top spade, then finessed the heart jack, noting West’s seven. Now he played a club, ruffed a diamond as East threw a club, took a second top club, and played dummy’s remaining top spade to pitch his last club.

Next came a second diamond ruff as East pitched his last spade, and since the defenders’ only plain-suit cards were spades, declarer could safely exit with the heart jack, knowing that if East won and had a spade to lead, declarer would be able to ruff low and not be overruffed. As the cards lay, East won and played back a heart, letting Madala finesse and claim his contract.

East had only one chance to make declarer’s life harder. When the fourth diamond was led from dummy, ruffing low would have given up any hope of getting a second trump trick. But might East have given declarer a losing option by ruffing high?

Declarer has to overruff, then has to read whether to exit with a high trump or a low one, depending on whether the remaining heart honor is bare or the nine is falling. I think declarer should get this right; if West has false-carded with the trump seven from 9-7-x, good luck to him.

 ??  ??
 ??  ?? ANSWER: A bid of one spade would show at least five, but you can double to show four spades and values, typically with diamond tolerance. You are very much at the minimum end of the range for this action, but if you do not bid now, you may never get an easy and relatively safe chance to show values.
ANSWER: A bid of one spade would show at least five, but you can double to show four spades and values, typically with diamond tolerance. You are very much at the minimum end of the range for this action, but if you do not bid now, you may never get an easy and relatively safe chance to show values.

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