Hand of the day #142
The Aces On Bridge by Bobby Wolff In today’s deal South responded three spades...
This conundrum was written by Patrick O'Connor and was originally published in the book, Demystifying Defense - you can find out all about it further down the page.
We are East. Our hand is:
North opens 1NT, we pass and South bids 3♠ showing at least six spades and 10+ points. Partner passes and North raises to 4♠. All pass, partner leads the ♣A and dummy comes down.
Lead: ♣A
Partner cashes the ♣A and ♣K, declarer playing the ♣3 and ♣Q. It looks like declarer is out of clubs. Partner switches to the ♥6 and the ♥7 is played from dummy. Things look comfortable for the defense. We already have two tricks and we have the ♥K and the ♦QJ sitting over dummy. The immediate issue is what to play to this trick.
Assuming partner has led the fourth best heart, how many hearts higher than this ♥6 are in the remaining three hands?
The Rule of 11 tells us to subtract the number of partner’s spot card, 6, from 11. This reveals that there are five cards higher than the six in the other hands. All three of dummy’s hearts are higher than the ♥6 and so are our ♥K and ♥9.
How many hearts higher than the ♥6 does declarer have?
Dummy has three and we have two so declarer has none!
Which card do we play to this trick?
We play the ♥9. As expected, it wins. Since partner must have the ♥Q, we can safely exit with the ♥K, and wait for the setting trick in one of the red suits (here it will be in diamonds).
Here is the full deal:
It would be a mistake to win the third trick with the ♥K. Declarer would win the return, draw trumps and finesse the♥J. This would then allow declarer to discard the diamond loser on the ♥A.
Post Mortem
This shows the usefulness of the Rule of 11. It is a good idea to get into the habit of using it on any opening lead of a small spot card. It doesn’t work when partner hasn’t led from a four-card or longer suit, but it is good practice to do the calculation.
O’Connor addresses the hardest aspect of cardplay: defense. After carefully explaining the basic concepts, he takes the reader through forty problems, using an ‘over the shoulder’ style, and explaining every play as it is made. Beginners typically have more trouble with defense than any other part of the game, and this book will go a long way towards removing their unease.
I think west should play the HT
If the leader has 9x, the contract is made
In earlier times there were no probs
now it is hard to play at bbo
pity
The same problem here. A few days in the row during evening time, the connection problem occurred very often to BBO.