TO STOP AN ENDPLAY, A DEFENDER MUST RISE

George S. Patton said, “I don’t measure a man’s success by how high he climbs, but how high he bounces when he hits bottom.”

A bridge player’s success may be measured by how high he plays — as in today’s deal.

South is in six spades. West leads the diamond king. How should South plan the play and how can East thwart his dastardly plan?

After North responds with four diamonds, a splinter bid showing fourplus spades, at least game-going values and a singleton (or void) in diamonds, South wonders whether his partner has both black-suit kings. If he does, seven spades will be anything between a favorite and laydown. Could your partnership uncover those cards? Most couldn’t.

South could bank all on the club finesse, but there is a better approach. He should win the opening lead, play a trump to dummy, cash the ace of hearts (discarding a low club from hand) and crossruff the red suits to eliminate them. Now declarer leads a club off the dummy. If East contributes the four or five, South covers with his eight to effect an endplay. West must either lead back into declarer’s acequeen club tenace or concede a ruff-and-sluff.

However, note that East can foil this plan by playing the club 10. Then, South should win with his ace, cross to dummy with a trump and lead a club toward his queen. He gets home whenever East has the king or when West has the king singleton or doubleton. Here, though, he goes down.

Whenever declarer has eliminated the side suits and is about to execute an endplay, second hand must play high.