Hand of the day #361
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: ♦J
One of the nicest-played hands I saw all last year was declared by the Italian superstar Giorgio Duboin. Given the East-West cards, six clubs looks somewhat ambitious, but if you bid them up, you have to play them accordingly.
Repeated trump leads will defeat this slam because these disrupt declarer’s entries and force him to rely on the spade finesse. But Duboin reached the slam after a tangled auction, where North miscounted her aces, then moved on over a sign-off.
Still, West gave declarer a chance when he led the diamond jack and East won her ace and returned a heart. Now, Duboin could win in hand, lead a trump to his 10, ruff a diamond, cross to the spade ace, ruff the last diamond, and overtake his remaining club with dummy’s ace to draw the last trump.
Now, on the lead of the diamond king, declarer’s last small heart was thrown (blanking the king) and West had to find a discard. He was down to the Q-8-6 of spades and Q-J of hearts.
A heart was obviously impossible, as declarer would cash the heart king and ruff a spade to dummy to cash the heart 10. However, on a spade discard, declarer simply cashed the spade king and ruffed out the spade queen, using the heart king as the entry for the established spade jack. Well played and a fully deserved pick-up for Duboin’s team.
Bid with the aces
Answer: 3♦
Your partner has suggested reversing values with the red suits. With a minimum for the auction and no stopper in the other major, just bid three diamonds and let your partner take it from there. A two-spade call here would suggest a spade stopper and a nonminimum, worried about clubs.
This Hand of the Day was originally published on aces.bridgeblogging.com.
You can now play the hand of the day on BBO+ and compare how you get on with the players in the article.