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The Aces On Bridge by Bobby Wolff

Opening Lead: ♣K

"Dad's Army," an old British television show, there was a character who was given to exclaiming "Don't panic!" A bad trump break can often inspire such sentiments, but stay focused and you can often limit the damage, or even emerge triumphant.

Today’s deal was just such an example. In six spades South appeared to have a decent chance to make 12 tricks in some comfort if spades behaved. He won the club lead and advanced the spade 10, covered by the king and ace, with West pitching a club.

The 5-0 break posed considerable problems. As East clearly had a singleton club, declarer needed East to hold three or four hearts and for at least one diamond ruff to stand up.

So he cashed the heart ace, king and queen, since East’s length in that suit would dictate the rest of the plan. To his surprise, West showed out on the third round, so South ruffed a heart in hand, played the diamond ace and king, then ruffed a diamond low.

In the four-card ending with the lead in dummy, North had the spade five and three losing clubs, South had the Q-J-6 of spades and a diamond, while East had his four low spades.

South led a club from dummy, overruffed East’s seven with his queen, then ruffed a diamond with dummy’s spade five, forcing East to overruff with the eight. In the two-card ending, East had to lead from his 9-4 of spades into declarer’s tenace — contract made!

Bid with the aces

This Hand of the Day was originally published on aces.bridgeblogging.com.

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