BRIDGE

Some contracts that initially appear very easy to play turn out, for one reason or another, to be much tougher than was originally anticipated. In such cases, declarer may have to use a little ingenuity to help him get home safely. Consider the present deal from a rubber-bridge game where South landed in four hearts instead of an ice-cold three notrump (he was trying to score 150 honors). West started with the K-A of spades, East signaling with the nine of diamonds on the second spade. West then continued with the queen of spades, ruffed by South with the ten. At this point, the contract seemed very easy to make. But when South next cashed the A-K of trump and East showed out, the previously promising picture changed drastically. Declarer realised that if he continued with the Q-J of trump, discarding a spade from dummy, he would then have no way to score the game-going trick with the jack of clubs. The alternative —a successful diamond finesse — seemed highly unlikely under the circumstances, given that West had started with the A-K-Q-J-x of spades and had passed initially. But our hero, South, was not born yesterday, and found a way out of his difficulties. Faced with the hard reality of the situation, he did play the Q-J of trump, but, on the last trump, he discarded dummy’s ace of diamonds! The rest of the play was simple enough. South next cashed the A-K-Q of clubs and then exited with the jack of diamonds. East won with the king, but had to yield the last two tricks to South’s queen of diamonds and jack of clubs. And so it was that South, by very good play, made four hearts and scored his 150 honours.