ACES ON BRIDGE

At no-trump, it is often right to underlead from a long suit headed by the ace-king, either to preserve communications or to unblock the suit. With sure entries on the side, a top card becomes more attractive, as bringing down declarer’s doubleton queen may outweigh communication issues. Here, when West led a low heart to the jack and queen, declarer saw that he would need a successful black-suit finesse. If West had only four hearts, South could afford to try each finesse, but if there were five hearts on his left, declarer might have to guess well. Declarer began with the diamond queen and ace to protect against bad breaks. Now South might have advanced the spade queen, tempting a cover. He would rise with the ace if East played low smoothly, intending to cash the diamonds and try the club finesse.

South did better, though. West’s play in diamonds suggested that he had begun with a doubleton. So, since the spot-card lead suggested hearts were not breaking 6-1, declarer could ensure his contract by throwing West in with a heart at once. West took his hearts as declarer threw black cards from both hands, but then he had to concede the ninth trick. Had declarer run his diamonds prematurely, he would have squeezed his own hand on the last one. Similarly, declarer could not afford to cash a third diamond because he would then have no reentry to dummy.

If West had led hearts from the top initially, declarer would have needed to guess which black-suit to play on.