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The Aces On Bridge by Bobby Wolff
Opening Lead: ♣6
Today's deal poses the sort of problem to which there is no good answer. South should make a response with five high-card points, taking a chance of getting too high, both in the hope of finding a spade fit and to avoid making it easy for the enemy to compete. On the next round, he should use his discretion to end the auction by passing two no-trump, since unless playing the Wolff signoff it may not be possible to stop in three spades. More on that later.
When West leads the club six against two no-trump, South wins dummy’s club 10 and leads the spade five. East should now think before automatically playing low. He should work out that it may be advantageous (and cannot cost anything) if he can be the defender to lead the second round of clubs. He should therefore split his spade honors to prevent declarer from ducking the trick to West. Equally, if declarer wins the spade ace, West must also avoid the automatic play of following with his small spade. He must unblock his queen, so that declarer cannot duck the next lead in spades to him, thereby preventing his partner from leading through declarer’s vulnerable club king. After each defender sacrifices a spade honor at his first turn, the contract is doomed.
The Wolff signoff, by the way, is a call of three clubs over the two no-trump rebid, after which a three-spade call by responder at his next turn is an attempt to play there.
Bid with the aces
Answer: 2NT
The best way to get your values across is to bid two no-trump now. This shows more than an overcall of two no-trump, hence about 18-20 high-card points. Let partner go from there in whichever direction he sees fit. The important thing is that you have transferred captaincy to him by describing your hand accurately.
This Hand of the Day was originally published on aces.bridgeblogging.com.
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