ACES ON BRIDGE

— William Shakespeare North-South overreached here at the 2014 European Championships in Opatija, Croatia, but declarer (with a little help) justified her ambition.

The problem in the auction came about because Sandra Probst, North, thought her combination of two spades followed by three diamonds was non-forcing, perhaps the standard interpretation (North would have to cue-bid to set up a force), while Tihana Brkljacic thought it was game-forcing.

West kicked off with the spade queen, an interesting choice but not a great one today. Brkljacic won with her king and ran the spade nine to East’s 10. A club switch would have been best at this point, but since West had bid hearts, East switched to the heart ace and another heart, covered by South’s queen.

West might have ducked the queen, but, having won her heart king, she realized that she could not afford to continue the suit. Assuming declarer held the diamond king for her opening bid,

East was marked with the club queen; otherwise, South would have opened one no-trump. So West switched to the club king.

Declarer won that with her ace and crossed to the diamond ace to cash her spade winners, discarding a diamond and two clubs from hand. Forced to come down to four cards, West was squeezed out of her remaining club and could no longer get to her partner’s club winners.

This meant that declarer could lead a diamond to her king and exit with her last diamond. That endplayed West to lead into the heart tenace for South’s ninth trick. ANSWER: The choice here is a simple one. One option is to bid two hearts, which would be natural and non-forcing, tending to deny diamond support. Alternatively, you can double, suggesting four or five hearts, diamond tolerance and enough values to hope for ownership of the hand. I’d bid two hearts, planning to raise diamonds if the opponents compete in a black suit.

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