Hand of the day #729
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The Aces On Bridge by Bobby Wolff
Opening Lead:♣K
Against four spades West led the club king, then the queen. Declarer ruffed, then simply played trumps from the top. When they did not behave, he eventually cashed the diamond ace and used dummy's heart entry to play a diamond toward the queen. With the diamonds lying the way they did, there was no way to avoid two losers in the suit, and declarer finished up with just nine tricks.
There is nothing intrinsically wrong with declarer’s play of the trump suit — the 2-2 break is more likely than a 3-1 break, and the overcall does not materially alter the odds in spades, though East has fewer clubs and thus more vacant spaces in his hand for trumps than does West. But the possibilities of an endplay are very real, and the winning line is one that you might fall into at the table.
After ruffing the second club, remember that since East did not raise clubs, West is likely to have the top club honors and thus be ripe for an endplay. Cash one top trump, then three hearts ending in dummy. If West can ruff in, you may be reduced to taking the diamond finesse; if not, run the spade jack on the second round of trumps.
As the cards lie, the finesse succeeds, but had trumps been 2-2, West would have won and could have done no better than play the third top club. You pitch your diamond loser and leave him endplayed for a ruff-sluff.
An alternative line after three rounds of hearts might be to run the club jack and discard a diamond on the trick.
Bid with the aces
Answer: 4♥
Your hand is hard to judge, but you surely want to drive to four hearts and help your partner work out what to do if your opponents bid on to four spades. However, a bid of three spades simply shows a sound raise to four hearts. And a jump to four clubs should promise a fit, with much better clubs than this. Thus, the jump to game is all that is left. Sometimes simplest is best.
This Hand of the Day was originally published on aces.bridgeblogging.com.
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