Hand of the day #456
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: ♣K
A brief but eventful auction ended with South in five hearts, against which West led the club king, ruffed in the dummy. Now a trump to the ace revealed the 3-0 break.
How would you continue to play the contract?
Suppose you ruff another club, cash dummy’s bare trump queen, and play a diamond. To make the contract on that line, you will eventually need to find West with the spade ace, so you can reach dummy with the spade king.
A far safer way to play the contract is to lead the diamond 10 at trick three.
Let’s say that West ducks the first round of diamonds and wins the second.
If the defenders play spades now, you will be able to draw trump, ending in the dummy, and enjoy the diamond suit.
West will probably force the dummy with a second round of clubs instead. You ruff with dummy’s penultimate trump, leaving the dummy with the bare queen and East still holding jack-10 of trump.
To neutralize East’s trump, you then lead winning diamonds from dummy. Whenever East ruffs in, you will overruff with the king and return to dummy with the trump queen, drawing East’s last trump. You can then play the remaining diamonds, throwing all of your spade losers, to claim an overtrick.
East could have taken his spade ace at the time West decided to force the dummy, but the contract would still have been impregnable.
Bid with the aces
Answer: 1♠
Even though you seem to be right at the minimum end of your range for a response, you absolutely cannot afford to pass here. With the boss suit, you must introduce it into the auction right now, or else you may never find your side's best fit.
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.
