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The Aces On Bridge by Bobby Wolff
Opening Lead: ♠J
Instant gratification is all very well, but at the bridge table you will generally find that "Make haste slowly" is a far better approach. I have often found that a suit splitting 3-3 at the start of a deal rates to split no worse than 3-3 at the end of it. Conversely, when you delay playing on a suit, you often find out far more about the opponents' hands — and opponents occasionally discard from a critical holding before they become aware of declarer's distribution.
Let’s look at today’s contract of six no-trump. The novice will play on clubs immediately, and depending on whether he guesses the suit accurately or not, he will end up with either 11 or 12 tricks. But there is no need for making a blind guess.
When the spade jack is led against six no-trump, declarer should win the queen and lead a low heart from the board. East wins the heart king and returns a spade. After cashing the spade and diamond winners, declarer takes the heart ace, and discovers that West began with a singleton heart. , He also began with five spades and three diamonds. The count in each of these suits is absolutely guaranteed since one defender or the other has shown out on each of these suits.
At this point West is known to have four clubs, so declarer cashes the club king and queen and can then finesse with complete confidence against West’s jack.
Bid with the aces
Answer: 2NT or 1♦
An argument could be made for a two-no-trump opening here (partner as a passed hand is unlikely to raise you to an umakeable slam). As against that, opening one diamond and jumping to two no-trump shows the best feature of your hand. Additionally, it is far from clear that the hand will play better your way up. (Imagine partner with queen-third of either clubs or hearts in three no-trump.)
This Hand of the Day was originally published on aces.bridgeblogging.com.
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