ACES ON BRIDGE

Bridge at the Dyspeptics Club is often equivalent to a game of hot potato. A contract may start out as makeable, or off in top tricks, but quite frequently the fate of the contract will switch from one side to the other. All too often it is the player who makes the last mistake who will come in for the criticism, while the other errors are glossed over altogether. See if you can decide how many times the outcome of today’s contract of three notrump changed hands here. West led a spade to the king, won the second spade and played the spade two, as East pitched a heart. Declarer next played a diamond to the king and a second diamond, thoughtfully ducking when East produced the queen. Now the suit had been established with West kept off lead, so declarer had nine tricks. When South started to brag about his foresight, North corrected him and told him that he was the poster child for the slogan “It’s better to be lucky than good.” How many mistakes had been made on the deal? Had East pitched his diamond queen under the king, the defense would have prevailed. But South could have broached diamonds by crossing to a top heart and leading a low diamond to his ace, then a diamond back. Now the defenders would be unable to unblock successfully. Or, if West had played a high (suit preference) spade at trick three, maybe East could have discarded the diamond queen at that point, rendering declarer helpless.