Bridge

What does the redouble of a negative double mean? It shows a useful hand that can’t raise, usually with a doubleton in partner’s suit. The West hand fits that definition, but many would have chosen to bid one no trump instead.

The defense took the first three spade tricks, with West discarding a club on the third. A low diamond was ducked to West’s queen and West continued with the 10 of diamonds to the jack, king, and ace. South cashed the nine of diamonds and led the queen of hearts, covered with West’s king and won in dummy with the ace. Declarer cashed dummy’s ace-king of clubs and ruffed a club. This established dummy’s 10 of clubs to no avail, as South’s last three cards were all trumps.

Declarer had been paying close attention, and he had a perfect count on the hand. He knew that West had started with 2-4-3-4 distribution and therefore had all three of the missing trumps. He led a low heart toward dummy’s seven. West won this with his nine, but then hand to lead away from his 10 and give South the last two tricks. Making two!

We might quibble about some of West’s defensive plays. The return of the 10 of diamonds didn’t work out and he would have defeated the contract had he not covered the queen of hearts. All of his plays, however, were reasonable. Let’s not bother with quibbles and just credit declarer with paying attention and making a nice play.