The Aces On Bridge by Bobby Wolff

“Metaphysics is the finding of bad reasons for what we believe upon instinct, but to find these reasons is no less an instinct..”
— F.H. Bradley

Sometimes the knee-jerk reaction to cover the card led can be a mistake. Take this deal, for example, a combination of tempo and avoidance issues.

Opening Lead: ♦10

South played in four hearts after West had overcalled in spades. When West tabled his singleton diamond 10, apparently marking East with the top diamonds and West with the club king, South reached automatically for dummy’s jack. Everybody covered, and South wasted no time in drawing trumps. Then he played a second diamond to East. All would have been well for declarer had East made the knee-jerk shift to a spade now, but East accurately switched to a club. West was sure to score his club king and spade ace, and that added up
to a one-trick set.

Do you see the point of the deal? If South plays low from dummy and his own hand at trick one, West remains on lead. Now South will have no difficulty in setting up dummy’s fifth diamond as a discard for his losing club, while keeping East off lead until it is too late for the club shift to hurt.

The other attraction in ducking the diamond 10 is that you get to find out at once if diamonds are 2-2 or 3-1. If East produces the eight, you know diamonds are 3-1; if he overtakes the 10, diamonds must be 2-2. On a different deal, that particular piece of knowledge might impact declarer’s strategy (for example, deciding whether to take a safety-play or not).

Bid with the aces

This Hand of the Day was originally published on aces.bridgeblogging.com.

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