ACES ON BRIDGE

Opening I’m sure Lead: you won’t Club replicate queen the error that declarer made when this deal came up at the table … will you?

In four hearts on the lead of the club queen, South correctly refrained from drawing all the trumps. He wanted to ruff both his spade losers in dummy rather than rely on a finesse, and he saw that he could allow for a 6-1 spade split by drawing two rounds of trumps first. If hearts broke evenly, declarer’s problems would be over. If not, he would still succeed when East had the singleton spade, by leading the second round through him, but only if both of dummy’s top hearts remained.

Declarer therefore won the club ace and laid down the heart ace-king. When East showed out, South cashed the top spades and ruffed the third in dummy. After returning to hand with a club ruff, declarer ruffed his final spade on the table.

The appearance of the club jack on the second round was worrying, but West simply could have been playing the card he was known to hold based on the lead, so declarer ruffed a club with the eight and was overruffed. Now he had no winning options remaining. He had to lose a trump and three diamonds no matter what he did.

Since West had not bid spades and would surely have led a singleton, declarer should have focused on protecting against the nasty club break, not the bad spade break.

When everyone follows to the heart ace, declarer ruffs a spade high in dummy, ruffs a club with the heart eight and then ruffs his final spade high. He can now draw trumps and claim.

ANSWER: It pays to lead aggressively against small slams in suits, with the goal of setting up a trick before your side’s key card is knocked out. Your best shot may therefore be to lead a spade here. A passive heart lead is also possible if you believe a bad trump break might be in the offing. With a singleton club, for example, I might be more inclined to take that action.