ACES ON BRIDGE

Today’s hand was played in the Transnational Teams at the 2015 World Championships. Most declarers failed in six hearts after the lead of the singleton diamond 10. They won the lead in hand, drew one round of trumps, then played a spade, intending to ruff the second spade in dummy. However, East produced the ace and gave West a diamond ruff to set the slam.

Geir Helgemo did much better. After brushing aside East’s psychic barrage while finding out that West had no key-cards, Helgemo faced the same diamond lead. He played low from the dummy, retaining the tenace, and won in hand. He then pulled two rounds of trumps, unblocked the club honors, and entered dummy with the heart ace to pitch a spade on the club king. A club ruff was followed by the remaining trumps, putting East under pressure. East could either reduce to one spade and two diamonds — and be thrown in to open the diamonds — or bare his diamond queen, which would fail since declarer had a full count. Why did Helgemo play like this? He supposed that West’s decision not to lead the suit his side had bid and raised suggested the diamond lead was a singleton. Also, East was marked with the spade ace on the bidding. Thus, Helgemo had a road map to his contract.

Even on a less informative auction, other declarers might have assumed that West would scarcely lead a side-suit singleton against a slam if he was looking at the spade ace. Given that inference, the winning line of play seems indicated.