Hand of the day #570
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: ♥10
West leads the heart 10 against your spade game. When this holds, West plays a second heart and you ruff with the eight. You cash the trump ace and king, assuming that if anyone is long in trumps, it will be West. East discards a heart on the second round, and now your aim is to make the contract when West started with the club king.
The key here is to cross to the diamond ace and ruff dummy’s last heart, removing West’s remaining card in the suit. Next, you run the diamond suit. If West refuses to ruff any of the diamonds, you will discard two clubs from your hand and throw West in with a trump. After scoring two trump tricks, he will have to lead away from the club king. The effect is the same if West ruffs one of your diamond winners. He can cash his other trump winner, but will then have to lead away from the club king.
Note that the defense at trick two was rather soft. East should have won the first trick with the jack and shifted to a club. Then West scores a trick with his club king. Now the contract can be made only with a double-dummy line that relies on your reading West’s original distribution. You would have to play one top trump and guess his precise distribution to reduce him to Q-10-4 of trumps and force him to ruff a diamond winner. He would then have to lead into the king-jack of trumps at trick 12.
Bid with the aces
Answer: Pass
Opinions differ widely about whether it is right to raise to two hearts here. I say no; your bad trumps and defensive values suggest not getting involved directly. If the opponents allow you to balance with two hearts, you might make that call, but otherwise, unless partner can bid again voluntarily, you may be better off letting sleeping dogs lie.
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.
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