ACES ON BRIDGE

This week’s deals were all played at the 2010 European Team Championships in Ostend, Belgium.

The Belarus women’s team made its first appearance on the European bridge stage at this event. They picked up a swing in today’s deal, played against Denmark, where Dorte Cilleborg and Dorthe Schaltz for Denmark played four hearts rather than the easier spade game.

At this table, West must have been used to her partner’s aggressive overcalling style, since she declined to make the normal-looking raise to five diamonds. However, this worked out extremely well when her opponents’ game went down. After the start of the diamond king, declarer ruffed and played a small heart to the queen in her hand. When the ace did not appear, she ruffed her second losing diamond and returned to hand with the spade king to play a heart honor to East’s ace. Now, a spade return nailed declarer to the table, and the defensive continuation was as easy as it was evident: Either East would ruff the third spade and wait for three club tricks, or, after a club lead from the table, East would be able to duck. This would be on the assumption that the defenders could prevail only if West had the club jack. Belarus scored 5 international match points on this board when five diamonds went one off in the other room. The winning line for declarer — which is not easy to see — is after ruffing the second diamond to play two rounds of spades ending in hand and only then play a heart. This “dentist’s coup” extracts East’s second spade, after which there is no defense.