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The Aces On Bridge by Bobby Wolff
Opening Lead: ♦5
Alan Osofsky and Alan Sontag won the von Zedtwitz Life Master Pairs at the nationals. This board came from the final session. Against the uninspiring contract of one heart, West led a diamond. Sontag won, cashed his other diamond, and exited with a spade. East took this with his queen and shifted to a club, West capturing declarer's 10 with his queen. West returned his second club, dummy's seven winning.
Declarer called for the diamond queen, and now East erred. If he had ruffed low, the defenders would still have been in control. But he ruffed with the 10, and South discarded a spade. West ruffed the third club, cashed his spade king, then led his last spade. Sontag carefully ruffed with his heart five and made his second nice play when he led the heart eight to dummy’s queen. East won with his ace and played his last spade, but South ruffed with his heart three and could overruff with dummy’s heart four, since West was reduced to nothing but diamonds and could not overruff. Now a club lead executed a trump coup, declarer’s K-9 of hearts being poised over East’s heart J-6.
That brilliant play by Sontag for plus 80 was worth 49.5 matchpoints out of 51. If the contract had gone down one, he and Osofsky would have received 38 matchpoints – a difference of 11.5. And they won the trophy by just 11 points!
Bid with the aces
Answer: 2♣
Even though your partner's double may be more focused on the majors than the minors, you should compete to two clubs at once. If you don't bid now, you may feel obliged to bid at your next turn when the stakes will be higher and the auction more risky. Bid now and tell your story in one go.
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.
