Hand of the day #306
You can now play the hand of the day on BBO+ and compare how you get on with the...
You can now play the hand of the day on BBO+ and compare how you get on with the players in the article.
The Aces On Bridge by Bobby Wolff
Opening Lead: ♣5
Annual BOLS bridge-tip competition, which contained a wealth of material for bridge journalists. Zia Mahmood won with a tip to the effect that defenders generally cover honors if they can.
This tip was used to good effect in the following hand played by Jeremy Dhondy.
In the other room the inelegant contract of four hearts had come home when East led a spade. Against four spades, though, West led a club. Declarer won this in hand and ruffed a club. Now he had the problem of which red-suit finesse to take. With Zia’s tip in mind, he led dummy’s diamond queen.
As the original reporter of this deal commented, in retrospect it was foolish of East to cover this card. Why would declarer play on this suit in this manner if he did not have the ace and jack? And if that were the case, then covering the diamond queen could only make life easier for him.
Had East resisted the urge to cover, declarer would have played for the red-suit kings to be the other way around. He would surely have risen with his diamond ace, ruffed his last club, and run the heart queen. West would have won his king and the defenders would have had two trump tricks and the diamond king to come. At the table, when the diamond queen was covered, declarer unblocked diamonds, ruffed a club, pitched a heart on the diamonds, and gave up two trumps.
Bid with the aces
Answer: 2♥
It would be nice to play a two-suited defense to one no-trump, allowing you to get both suits off your chest at one go. DONT, Cappelletti and Woolsey work well to achieve this target. But if you do not have any of these methods available, you should bid two hearts rather than pass. You may not have a great hand, but you do have good shape. In balancing seat that is almost enough on its own.
This Hand of the Day was originally published on aces.bridgeblogging.com.
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