Contract Bridge

The basic purpose of a safety play is to try to protect against an unfavorable distribution of the adverse cards. For example, if declarer has K- Q-10-x-x of a suit facing dummy’s A- 9-x-x, he can assure five tricks by first cashing the king. This protects him against J-x-x-x in either opponent’s hand. But if declarer started by playing the ace first, he could no longer score all five tricks in the suit if his left- hand opponent started with J-x-x-x.

In another form of safety play, declarer may intentionally concede a trick he might not have to lose in order to guard against an unfavorable division. Today’s hand features a play of this type.

The declarer was Harold Ogust, and he reached three notrump on the bidding shown. West led a club, won by South with the queen, and Ogust shrewdly resisted the temptation to cash the K- Q of spades in the hope of scoring six spade tricks.

Instead, he played the king and then overtook the queen with dummy’s ace! Had the opposing spades divided 3-2, he would have played a third round to assure nine tricks.

But East showed out on the ace of spades, and now the wisdom of Ogust’s farsighted safety play came to fruition. He led the ten of diamonds from dummy, and the opponents were helpless.

If East covered the ten with the queen, Ogust would win with the ace and continue with the jack to guarantee nine tricks consisting of two spades, one heart, four diamonds and two clubs.

And if East played low on the ten of diamonds, Ogust would make the same nine tricks, after losing the ten to West’s king, by later repeating the diamond finesse.

Had Ogust cashed the K- Q of spades at the start — as most would have done — he almost surely would have gone down.