Contract Bridge

In a vacuum, South would almost surely go down in three notrump on this deal. He would win the first or second heart, run his clubs and end up trying a diamond finesse for his ninth trick. West, who would have discarded a diamond, a heart and two spades on the clubs, would take the queen of diamonds with the king and cash his remaining hearts and the ace of spades for down one.

But when the deal occurred in a 2001 team contest, declarer was not operating in a vacuum. He had heard West open the bidding and proceeded to take full advantage of what he knew about West’s hand.

After East produced the queen of hearts at trick one, it was easy to place West with the ace of spades, K-J of hearts and king of diamonds for his opening bid. And since West’s seven of hearts was presumably his fourth-best heart, East’s queen was known to be his only heart higher than the seven.

What all this added up to was that if declarer ducked the first heart, won the second and then ran his clubs, discarding a spade and a diamond, West would almost certainly be holding the ace of spades, K-x of diamonds and two hearts as his last five cards. South would then concede a spade to West, who could cash his two remaining hearts but would then have to lead a diamond from the king to give South his ninth trick.

West’s only hope of escaping this ending would be to keep all three of his hearts and reduce himself to the singleton king of diamonds and ace of spades as his last five cards. Then, if declarer led a spade at trick nine, West would collect four tricks for down one.

This scheme could not succeed against an alert declarer, however. If West kept all of his hearts, South would know West had bared his king of diamonds and would cash the ace to make the contract.