ACES ON BRIDGE
“All men are liable to error; and most men are, in many points, by passion or interest, under temptation to it.”
— John Locke
Follow the original play in this deal, and see if you can spot declarer’s error.
Against three no-trump West did not want to broach either major after South had shown hearts (implying spades in the North hand), so he tried a diamond. Declarer won, unblocked the other diamond top card and ran the spade jack successfully. A spade to the 10 came next, followed by the diamond jack to West’s queen. Sadly for declarer, the heart ace was with East, so declarer could not reach the pointed-suit winners in dummy and eventually had to go down.
When did South err, then? He could have relied on the club suit for his tricks, but that would not necessarily have worked either. Declarer would surely take a first-round finesse of the club queen, after which East’s club 10 would provide a slow stopper.
No, South was right to bank on the diamonds, but his execution was awry. After unblocking the diamond honors, declarer should have overtaken the spade jack with the queen in dummy, garnering an extra entry when the king is onside. Here, the spade queen holds, and declarer can clear the diamonds. Now he will eventually emerge with nine tricks — three spades, a heart, four diamonds and a club — even if West finds the shift to hearts after winning the diamond queen.
Note that if the spade queen had lost to East’s king, declarer would have fallen back on bringing the clubs in. As long as clubs play for one loser, declarer cannot be denied nine tricks.
ANSWER: Lead the heart six. A spade lead could easily be right, but there is nothing to suggest that partner will have help in the suit. As long as declarer does not have nine cashing tricks, a heart lead should go a long way toward setting up that suit. With the spade 10 in addition, I suppose I might go the other way.
If you would like to contact Bobby Wolff, e-mail him at bobbywolff@mindspring.com. Copyright 2023, Distributed by Universal Uclick for UFS