You can now play the hand of the day on BBO+ and compare how you get on with the players in the article.
The Aces On Bridge by Bobby Wolff
Opening Lead: ♣J
North-South have a great fit here, together with a lot of controls, and it is easy to imagine that they might get bid to at least the five-level. Today, though, the secret is to stop at the four-level, then to play the hand carefully to come home with even 10 tricks.
A reasonable approach in four hearts is to win the club lead and take a diamond finesse. If the defenders play a second club, then declarer will ruff, draw trump, and play the diamond ace and another diamond. When that suit fails to break, he will ruff the fourth diamond in dummy and try to play spades for one loser. If that fails, declarer will go down and will doubtless consider himself unlucky.
However, it is possible to do much better than that. In fact, on careful play the contract is 100 percent guaranteed. After the club lead, declarer must win and ruff the club five in his hand. He now makes sure of 10 tricks by drawing trump in as many rounds as required, then playing the diamond ace and another diamond. When a defender wins that, he cannot play another diamond or it will set up a trick for declarer in that suit, nor can East shift to spades effectively. If declarer ducks the trick, West can win, but will be confronted with the same dilemma, since a ruff-sluff lets declarer ruff in hand and pitch a spade loser.
Bid with the aces
Answer: 2♦
A simple call of two hearts would show extras, but not a hand this good. It feels right to cue-bid two diamonds, then bid three hearts. That should be natural and forcing, and help to get you to the right major-suit strain.
This Hand of the Day was originally published on aces.bridgeblogging.com.
If you’re a BBO+ member, you can now play the Hand of the Day directly on BBO as part of your membership benefits.
Go to the BBO+ section, select BBO+ Games and Events, then click Play Today’s Deal to give it a try and compare your result with the players featured in the article.
