Hand of the day #594
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The Aces On Bridge by Bobby Wolff
Opening Lead: ♣10
Today's deal saw North produce a slightly aggressive raise to three hearts after his partner's simple rebid of hearts. The fact that the opponents had not supported spades did suggest that his partner would have length there — which made the action rather less attractive than it might appear. At teams or rubber bridge when vulnerable, the action is not unreasonable, but at pairs it is important in positions of this sort to protect the plus score.
When West opted for a passive club lead rather than an aggressive diamond lead, it tipped declarer off to the idea of rejecting the finesse. So South went up with the club ace and decided to set up the spades in the process of ruffing out the suit.
At trick two he passed the spade nine around to West, who won cheaply and shifted to the trump seven. South won the king in dummy, crossed to hand with the diamond ace, and led out the spade king, covered by the ace and ruffed.
At this point declarer could ruff a club back to hand, draw all the trumps, and give up a spade to the queen. That left him with the master spade eight for his 10th trick. In all, he lost two spades and one diamond.
The defenders could have defeated the game with an initial trump lead. And had West led the diamond jack, declarer might well have miss guessed the play by taking an early club finesse — which would not have been a success!
Bid with the aces
Answer: 3♥
The raise to two hearts should be at the lower end of a simple raise. (Sophisticated partnerships have other ways to show a decent hand.) North could have started with a redouble, or, with partnership agreement , have bid two clubs to show a constructive major-suit raise. Here, you do not have enough to make a game-try; a simple call of three hearts is enough now.
This Hand of the Day was originally published on aces.bridgeblogging.com.
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