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The Aces On Bridge by Bobby Wolff
Opening Lead: ♣10
When South makes a jump shift at his second turn, there is a case for North to rebid spades rather than raise diamonds. However, his actual choice made reaching slam much easier.
The play in six diamonds should develop in straightforward fashion. South wins the opening lead with the club ace, cashes the trump ace to find the bad news, then must play the top hearts, discarding clubs from table.
East ruffs the third heart and plays back a club to force dummy to ruff, a play that is as good as anything for the defense. After ruffing, declarer must now lead the spade king, planning to take the ruffing finesse. East covers and South trumps, then ruffs a club back to dummy and discards his heart losers on the two spade winners. All that remains is to finesse against East’s trump queen, and declarer can claim his 12 tricks.
East does better to discard a spade on the third heart, rather than ruffing in. Now declarer ruffs a club to dummy and leads the spade king, covered and ruffed.
Declarer ruffs another club to dummy and throws a heart on the spade queen. Then he leads dummy’s last spade winner, overruffs East, and ruffs his heart loser with the diamond jack. East can now score just one trump trick whatever he does.
Bid with the aces
Answer: Double
Since a jump to three spades would be based on shape not high cards, your choice is to bid three hearts as a spade raise or double for takeout, then bid spades. I prefer the second route; with a defensive hand, you don't want partner saving in four spades prematurely. By showing your strength first, you save him from error.
This Hand of the Day was originally published on aces.bridgeblogging.com.
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