ACES ON BRIDGE

“Nothing contributes so much to tranquilize the mind as a steady purpose -- a point on which the soul may fix its intellectual eye.”

-- Mary Shelley

How should the defense go against four spades in today’s deal?

When West leads the diamond king, East can see that it is possible that if declarer has the heart jack in addition to his other assets, but a 5-43-1 pattern, then the defenders must cash their three diamond winners on the go, or the third diamond gets away on dummy’s winning club. In that case, he would need to overtake the diamond king and return the suit.

But the actual lie of the cards looks slightly more likely. Here, East must duck the first diamond, and West must not continue the suit. Instead, he can see from his own hand that the defenders must prevent heart ruffs, so he must shift to a trump, leaving his partner with a re-entry for a second trump play.

Declarer wins the trump shift on the table and leads a heart to the queen. West takes his king and plays a low diamond to East’s ace. Now a second trump from East leaves South a trick short; he has eight winners, and a ninth will come from a heart ruff, but there is no possibility of another trick against sound defense.

It is always challenging to shift to trump in this sort of position. The risk exists that you are chopping up partner’s trump holding, whereas if left to his own devices, declarer would lose an additional trick. However, the knowledge that declarer needs heart ruffs in dummy means that the trick will likely come back one way or another.

ANSWER:

I would normally lead a doubleton, looking for a ruff, but here my spades are too weak and my club honor potentially too significant for this to feel right. Since my partner is quite likely to have a doubleton heart, I don’t like opening up that suit either, so it is a toss-up between diamonds and spades. I’ll go for the diamond three.