ACES ON BRIDGE
“My goal as an actor is always to be as truthful as possible and to find the truth in the material I am representing. So I think that it’s the same with performing music. But in a way, performing your own music, it’s easier to find the truth in it, because it’s coming from yourself. There’s no translation needed.”
— Zooey Deschanel
Carrying on with this week's subject of holdups, how would you play three no-trump here as South after West leads the spade six? When this board was played in a teams game, one declarer allowed East's spade jack to win. His intention was to exhaust East's spades so that if he held at least one of the club honors, he would have no spade to play when he gained the lead. East returned a spade to the bare ace, and when West turned up with both of the high clubs, declarer lost three spades and two clubs to go one down.
This line did not seem best to the declarer in the featured room, Omar Sharif, if only because, from his perspective, a heart switch at trick two could have been dangerous. Sharif looked carefully at the opening lead, the spade six. This was a fourth-best card, so he could tell that East held precisely one of the queen, jack or 10. (He could not hold the spade seven because West surely would have led an honor from a Q -J-10 combination.) It followed that declarer could block the spades by rising with the ace at trick one. In this way, he would also not run the risk of getting a heart switch. When declarer played on clubs, West won the first round and continued spades. Sharif allowed East to win with the bare jack, and now he could not be prevented from setting up the club suit, ending with an overtrick.
Declarer had to delay his holdup in spades until a time when East could not continue the danger suit.
ANSWER: Raise to three spades. Your intent is to make it as hard as possible for the opponents to get hearts into the auction, and raising the level might be just the ticket. Ace-doubleton should be more than enough support for partner. Your raise forces the opponents to guess, and taking away a round of bidding from them is worth the investment of upping the ante for your side by a trick.