ACES ON BRIDGE

“It’s a poor sort of memory that works only backwards, ”the Queen remarked. — Lewis Carroll

In the first set of the semi-finals of the U.S. Women’s Trials of 1997, the squad captained by Sue Picus eliminated most of their carryover deficit, thanks to a neat defense by Lisa Berkowitz and Marinesa Letizia.

Juanita Chambers’ decision to pass four hearts was not an obvious one, but partner Kathie Wei-Sender found herself in a perfectly playable spot. Letizia led the diamond ace, on which her partner’s diamond four suggested a club shift. The club 10 was taken by dummy’s ace, as Berkowitz followed with the seven, presumably denying the eight.

Now declarer ran the heart jack, ducked to West’s queen. If Letizia had returned the club nine, the eight in declarer’s hand would have become established. Similarly, a diamond would furnish a ruffand-discard, which would not accomplish anything for the defense.

However, Letizia switched to a low spade, forcing declarer to commit herself at once. Wei-Sender finessed the queen successfully and tried a second heart, but Berkowitz took her heart ace and returned a second spade. Declarer was now isolated from her spade suit, and the best she could do was try to drop the club queen. When that failed, she was down one.

Since in the other room Mildred Breed was declarer in four spades, which could not be defeated, that was a big swing to the Picus team. They ended up as the comfortable winners of the match and went on to win the trials, then captured the Venice Cup in Tunisia.

LEAD WITH THE ACES

ANSWER: Leading a high diamond from a holding of this sort will be most effective when declarer has the diamond ace facing the doubleton jack. But even then it may not suffice to defeat the contract, since you have no sure entry on the side. By contrast, leading a low diamond looks much better when partner has either the doubleton diamond jack or ace, and it may also give declarer a guess at trick one.