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The Aces On Bridge by Bobby Wolff
Opening Lead: ♣5
Since my column started appearing online, my correspondents have been writing to me from all around the world. But I believe today's deal may be the first provided to me by an Indian correspondent. Shantanu Rastogi from Lucknow passed on a deal that arose in the finals of the Indian Senior trials.
As you can see, six diamonds looks like a very comfortable affair, but North took the precipitous decision to leap to the no-trump slam, and East alertly doubled. This is the Lightner double, named after the American expert Theodore Lightner, asking for the lead of dummy’s first-bid suit.
I could not resist a smile when I read Shantanu’s somewhat acerbic description of the West player as a Godzilla — the same term Zia Mahmood had used to describe a partner more dangerous to his side than the opponents. Be that as it may, West led a club, and declarer won in dummy and advanced the heart queen. East took the trick, and found out to his dismay that after the run of all the minor-suit winners, he could not now protect himself from the spade-heart squeeze whether he returned a heart or a spade.
As the commentators sagely noted, after the event, the slam still goes down if East refuses to take either of the first two heart tricks, since declarer no longer has any communication between his hand and dummy. I’m not sure why this play is hard to spot, but it is.
Bid with the aces
Answer: 3NT (Mini-splinters)
This hand is surely strong enough to drive to game, since even facing a minimum balanced hand, your singleton may still leave partner cold for game. That said, some play mini-splinters (a jump to three no-trump over one spade or to three spades over one heart showing a raise to game, with 9-12 points and an unspecified splinter).
This Hand of the Day was originally published on aces.bridgeblogging.com.
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