ACES ON BRIDGE

“An umbrella is of no avail against a Scotch mist.”

-- J.R. Lowell

Scotland won its first-ever gold medal at bridge at the 3rd Commonwealth Nations Bridge Championship. Today’s hand from that event sees Tony Nunn of Australia drawing inferences from the bidding and play that allow him to land his contract.

After West dealt and passed, North-South bid unopposed to four hearts, against which West led the spade queen. Nunn rose with dummy’s ace, under which East played the king, a revealing card. Declarer called for the heart five from dummy. East followed with the four, and Nunn rose with the king, collecting West’s queen.

After that, the rest was relatively plain sailing. Nunn led a club to the ace, the club king, then ruffed a low club, collecting East’s queen in the process. Next came three rounds of diamonds ending in dummy, and the club jack. East did the best he could when he ruffed with the seven, but South overruffed with the jack. That was nine tricks in the bag, and with three trumps left in dummy to East’s two, the game was now assured.

You might ask yourself why Nunn led to the heart king at trick two. At trick one, East had unblocked the spade king under the ace. He surely wouldn’t have done so from a three-card suit, so he had either a singleton or doubleton king, which in turn meant that West had started with at least five decent spades. If West had also held the heart ace, Nunn reckoned he likely would have overcalled at his second turn, hence East had that card.

ANSWER: One possibility is to cue-bid two clubs to get partner to pick a major, but I believe you are about a queen short of an invitational sequence. I think I prefer the simple route of bidding one spade, planning to compete to two hearts when given an opportunity so as to get both suits in economically. If the auction stops in one spade, we will not have missed game.