BRIDGE

If you think South’s chosen bid for intervention bears little or no resemblance to what he actually held, you’re right!

One notrump directly over an opponent’s opening bid would promise:

*Stopper in the opponent’s suit? Not quite but maybe a combined stopper if his partner could provide a secondary honour.

*15-17 high-card points? Not quite but maybe the two ten’s and decent five-card suit were compensating values.

*A balanced hand? Well, almost but not quite!

A lot of “not quites” and “maybes” so why the bid? Because South’s team was seriously in arrears in a long match that was nearing completion and he was trying to stir things up in a desperate attempt to make up the deficit.

NOTE: in all likelihood, the deficit was at least partially caused by too many similar efforts in the match’s early stages, said efforts being nowhere near as successful as this one was.

Because West (who really should have known better) believed his opponent and tried the surprise opening lead of his fourth-best club!

And it was indeed a very surprised South who scampered for home with two club tricks, six diamonds and the ace of hearts.

No money-back warranty if you try this tactic in your game and it fails miserably.

Postscript: not enough similar aberrant bids and plays worked out for the trailing team and they lost the match.

But let’s give the final word to East who had gone out of his way to open a tad light because he really, really wanted a spade lead if his side ended up defending: “Maybe if I had bid diamonds, you would have led a spade?”.