Contract Bridge
All sorts of weird goings-on occur in world championship events. Players are at times seized by wild flights of fancy in the bidding or play, or make errors that even a beginner wouldn’t make, and these aberrations often lead to unusual results that become the basis for amusing
— and sometimes hair-raising — stories.
Consider today’s deal from a match between Peru and Switzerland. The Peruvian South got to three notrump, and Swiss star Jean Besse led the five of spades.
Declarer won with the ace and, realizing that the contract could not be stopped if the diamonds were divided 3-2, led a low club to dummy’s queen. East won with the ace and shifted to the jack of hearts. Declarer ducked the jack and also the king, Besse signaling encouragement with the four followed by the deuce. South then took the next heart lead with the ace.
Aware that West had the missing queen of hearts, South decided to play a low diamond and duck it into East’s hand in order to guard against a possible 4-1 diamond division.
Accordingly, South led the deuce of diamonds toward dummy. When Besse played the four, declarer played dummy’s three in order to force East to win the trick. But East couldn’t oblige, and Besse’s four unexpectedly won the trick! He then cashed the queen of hearts to put the contract down one.
Of course, Besse should have played the nine of diamonds — which would have assured defeat of the contract — instead of the four, and declarer should have played dummy’s seven — which would have given him his ninth trick — instead of the three, but the fact is that neither of them did what he should have done.
However, par — down one at three notrump — was achieved, though in a most peculiar manner. Homer nodded not once but twice, and the nods canceled each other out.