Goren on Bridge

We haven’t seen our old friend Trump Coup Tommy in many months. We hope he will return soon. Tommy played this deal some years ago. It led to his nickname.

West started the defense with the ace and another diamond. Tommy won in hand and led a trump to dummy’s king. He was totally bored with this hand until West discarded on the first trump. Tommy was energized when he realized that he would need a trump coup to make this slam. He would need an ending where he had just the ace-queen-nine of spades with the lead in dummy. He cashed dummy’s jack of spades and ace of clubs before ruffing a club in hand. This reduced his trump length to the same length as East.

To achieve the ending that he wanted, East was going to have to follow suit to three heart tricks. That was a little risky, but there was no way around it. Tommy cashed the ace and queen of hearts before leading a heart to dummy’s king. When East followed, Tommy was almost there. He needed to cash one more winner in dummy, so he continued with the 10 of hearts. Had East ruffed, Tommy would have over-ruffed, drawn the trumps and cashed a diamond. When East discarded instead, Tommy discarded his last diamond and he had the ending that he wanted. Any lead from dummy and Tommy scored the last three trump tricks. Nicely played!

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