Aces on Bridge

These days in almost every auction where the opponents bid or double, it is possible for responder to play transfers — and today’s deal from the Silodor Open Pairs in Philadelphia last year was no exception. The auction might have developed in a similar fashion, with South declaring three diamonds, if West had made a pre-emptive jump to two spades, but his initial call of two hearts showed six spades of indeterminate range.

The question of how many tricks South would emerge with in three diamonds had a slightly surprising answer, though. You’d expect West to lead a doubleton club and South to take East’s queen, draw trumps in two rounds, then set up a club for the ninth trick.

Instead, East managed to throw an intriguing diversion at the first trick when he played the club king, trying to suggest a different lie of that suit to declarer.

It worked to perfection! South was now sure West had three clubs and six spades, and clearly at least three hearts from the bidding. So she drew just one round of trumps with the ace and played a second club. East won the queen and could have played for the spade ruff, but that would have produced only four tricks. Instead, he cashed the heart king as West gave count, then played a third club. Declarer guessed to discard a spade, and West ruffed in with the jack and played the spade ace and a second spade to give partner the ruff and set the hand.