BECKER BRIDGE

A Case for the Defense

East dealer. North-South vulnerable. This deal occurred in a pairs event. As happens so often, the results differed strikingly from table to table. Games and partscores in spades and diamonds were attempted with varying success, but the play was most interesting at those tables where the contract was five diamonds.

There was nothing complicated about the play at most of these tables. West led the king of hearts and continued the suit after East signaled with the eight or nine.

Declarer ruffed, cashed the A-K of trumps and finessed the queen of spades. East took his king and returned a club, but South rejected the finesse, since he had a sure way to avoid a club loser by taking the ace and playing three rounds of spades, discarding a club from dummy. At these tables, declarer made five diamonds.

They would not have succeeded, however, had the defence been sharper. At trick one, East should have overtaken the king of hearts with the ace and returned a club. Had he done that, South would have gone down one.

It is not an extraordinary feat for East to take the king of hearts with the ace in order to lead a club. He should assume West's overcall was based on a five-card suit, which in turn means declarer has only one heart.

East should count on the ace of hearts and king of spades as two tricks for the defence and should conclude that his side's best chance for a third trick lies in clubs.

Once this conclusion is reached, it is clear that clubs should be attacked at trick two, and, obviously, that it must be better for the club lead to come from East.