ACES ON BRIDGE

“To most people, nothing is more troublesome than the effort of thinking.”

-- James Bryce

As declarer, you should delay committing yourself until you have found out as much information as possible. Here, after East opened with a weak two- spade bid, South passed initially, then jumped to three no- trump at his next turn. When North invited slam, South felt North must have had a maximum for his first two calls, so he went for it.

Against six no- trump, West led the club jack, won in dummy. Once the spade ace was dislodged, South could count 11 tricks and knew he had to look to the minors to furnish the 12th. However, there was no reason to hurry, so at trick two declarer played dummy’s spade king. When East won and returned a spade, South cashed all his major suit winners, West discarding a heart and a club on the spades, and East a spade on the third heart.

Declarer now knew East had six spades, two hearts and a club. South continued with the club queen, and when East showed out, his shape was revealed as 6- 2- 4- 1.

Whereas the bidding and early play might have suggested that West was the likelier candidate to have diamond length, South now had the evidence to come to the opposite conclusion. Since East had twice as many diamonds as West, it was twice as likely that East had the jack. So declarer led a diamond to dummy and then successfully finessed the diamond 10. The diamond queen followed by a club to the king saw the diamond king represent the 12th trick.

ANSWER: Declarer rates to have the top end of a strong no- trump with four spades and most likely five clubs, with either two cards in each red suit or a singleton diamond and three hearts. Meanwhile, dummy rates to have only three clubs, as he did not revert to three clubs, perhaps with five diamonds. Since West did not try one no- trump at his second turn, I’d go after hearts as our most likely source of tricks.