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The Aces On Bridge by Bobby Wolff
Opening Lead: ♠3
Former president of the European Bridge League Bill Pencharz reported this deal, played by Mary Gordon at his duplicate bridge club in the depths of central France. As he said, Mary is a fine intuitive player, and when this deal came up at her table while she was playing with Bill, she got it right, without apparent pause for thought. Few of us would have been able to duplicate her play — or her speed.
Defending four hearts, after a spade to East’s queen, a diamond to West’s ace and a diamond ruff, East didn’t have the courage to switch to a club, which would have broken up the position. Instead, he played a heart, giving Mary her chance.
Five rounds of hearts followed (two clubs being discarded from dummy) and two further rounds of diamonds saw the lead in dummy in a three-card ending, with North holding the K-9 of spades and the bare club ace while declarer had two clubs and a trump left.
Both defenders now needed to keep two spades or declarer could establish a winner in that suit. If East bared his spade ace, declarer would ruff a low spade to hand, and if West came down to the bare spade jack, declarer would lead the spade king from dummy to establish the dummy’s nine.
Accordingly, both defenders reduced to one club. Mary cashed the club ace, ruffed a spade to hand, and took her long club at trick 13.
Bid with the aces
Answer: 3♥
Your partner signed off facing your limit-raise or better in diamonds. What now? It would be premature to bid three no-trump directly. Try three hearts, hoping partner can bid three no-trump with a positional club stop such as the queen. If he temporizes with a three-spade bid, you will be forced to bid three no-trump, having shown doubt in the process.
This Hand of the Day was originally published on aces.bridgeblogging.com.
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