ACES ON BRIDGE

In this deal from the Chicago NABC last summer, you would probably want to play six diamonds, but getting to a 4-4 minor-suit slam with a combined 29-count isn’t easy. And while slam certainly wasn’t cold, it offered the opportunity for careful play. A relatively natural sequence like this one, where North showed a balanced 12-14 then 4-5 in the minors, worked well. In six diamonds, after a low club lead, it seemed logical to play a cross-ruff. South cashed the club ace, ruffed a club, went to the spade ace and ruffed a second club, then cashed the high hearts. When East produced an ominous queen, it seemed unlikely to be a false-card unless he had the jack as well, so declarer changed tack. A spade ruff and a club ruff with a high trump reduced everyone down to four cards. If you now decide to trust the opponents’ carding, you have a guaranteed route to 12 tricks. Play the diamond queen, then the spade jack. When West shows out, the diamond 10 and ace are good for two tricks. But had West produced the spade queen, you would have discarded dummy’s club loser. In that case, if you believe his earlier carding, East will have started with precisely a 3-2-4-4 pattern. He would have to ruff his partner’s winner and lead into dummy’s diamond tenace at the end. At the table, the opportunity for brilliance ended when West showed out on the spade, but the swing NorthSouth scored for making slam was a perfectly acceptable alternative.