ACES ON BRIDGE

The Venice Cup is the world championship for women, and in Bali last year it was won by the Americans, who narrowly defeated the English in the final. Today’s deal comes from England’s victory in the semifinals against another of the world’s powerhouse women’s teams, the Chinese. In today’s deal, though, the Chinese came off best, with Yan Liu at the helm in a delicate no-trump game.

Susan Stockdale led the heart nine to the two, 10 and queen. Things didn’t look that good for declarer, since a lot had to be done to be able to scramble nine tricks together.

At trick two, Liu made the natural play of the diamond jack, which went to the king, ace and seven. Liu’s key play came at the next trick when she led a club to the nine and West’s jack.

Stockdale now shifted to a spade, and Liu won the trick with her king. The club queen followed, and when that wasn’t covered and the 10 appeared from East, declarer was able to repeat the finesse in clubs. She ended up scoring one spade, two hearts and three tricks in each minor. This technique in the club suit is called an intra-finesse, and it involves finessing against a doubleton honor, then pinning it on the next turn.

Incidentally, had West won the first club and returned the suit, declarer would have cashed her club and diamond winners, then endplayed West with the fourth diamond to lead spades for her.

ANSWER: Had you doubled one heart in direct seat, you would be minimum in high cards, even though your shape was attractive. Your decision to bid on or pass would be a close one. But as a balancing hand, you should consider that you are in no way ashamed of your values. Your aces and singleton give you full value for a three-spade call — an aggressive player might simply bid game.