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The Aces On Bridge by Bobby Wolff
Opening Lead: ♦K
Decades ago, Michael Rosenberg, considered to be one of the game’s greatest technicians, wrote an extremely interesting bridge autobiography called “Bridge, Zia … and Me.” It’s a fascinating trawl through his bridge life, and his partnership with the charismatic Zia Mahmood.
The hands are fascinating (but are not for the beginner) and his novel outlook gives food for thought. Michael is known as one of the finest card players in the world as well as one of the slowest, and you can guarantee that he will never fail to solve a problem because he has not pondered it long enough.
He claims that today’s deal is his favorite in his book. You are in six hearts, and your only chance of making it appears to be if East holds the spade king either singleton or doubleton. Yet even though West holds the critical card, you should still make the contract!
West cashes a top diamond and plays another, which you ruff. Now play the rest of your hearts, discarding two small spades from dummy. Then come the three clubs, ending in dummy. In the three-card ending, you have reduced to queen-third of spades in dummy facing ace-jack-third in your hand. If East has not discarded a spade, you finesse. But he does. Now consider that no-one would discard from king-third of spades in this position. Therefore, he must have started with four. If they include the king, you are sunk; so you take your only chance and play to the ace.
Bid with the aces
Answer: 3♣
In this auction, when the opponents compete, your partner's reverse shows real extras, with four hearts and at least five clubs. You do not need to repeat your spades here, since partner will introduce three-card support if he has it, and if he doesn't, you do not want to play spades. A simple three-club call here is natural and nonforcing and sums up your hand perfectly.
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.
