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The Aces On Bridge by Bobby Wolff

Opening Lead: ♥K

Do you like the way North handled his cards in today's deal? I do. It is simple and straightforward, since North can reasonably expect to buy a decent five-card diamond suit. So long as his partner does not have significant wasted values in spades, slam should have good play. A slightly more prudent approach would be to jump to four spades at the second turn, as long as that promises specifically a singleton spade and not a void. If partner signs off in five diamonds, one can respect that approach.

Of course, today it turns out that South does have an almost wasted spade king and nothing in hearts — not to mention that neither clubs nor diamonds will behave as South might wish. And still the slam has decent play (if you can spot the winning line, which is not necessarily obvious).

The heart king goes to dummy’s ace, and declarer plays the diamond king, and a diamond to the ace. Next come the club ace, king, and queen, on which South throws a heart. A club ruff follows, and declarer next leads a diamond to the queen and takes the fifth club, discarding his last heart from hand.

In the four-card ending, dummy has a trump, a spade and two hearts, while South has three spades and a trump left. West has two spades and two hearts, and when declarer leads a spade to the 10, West must win but then cannot lead either major without conceding the rest.

Bid with the aces

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

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