The Aces On Bridge by Bobby Wolff

Of all the hands that won a BOLS brilliancy prize, few, if any, can have been so close to a unanimous choice as the winner of the 1985 award.

Opening Lead: ♥10

Put yourself in East’s seat, defending against three no-trump. Declarer wins the first trick with the heart ace and leads a spade to the jack, as partner follows with the seven. Then South cashes the heart queen, partner suggesting an original holding of five cards, and leads the diamond king, partner showing an odd number of cards in that suit too.

Assuming that declarer has a 5-2-4-2 shape, what should today’s East, Anders Brunzell, do next? Clearly a spade or diamond lead will achieve nothing. The simple move would be to play ace, king and a third club. However, when declarer crosses to the spade king, finds the bad news, and then takes dummy’s heart winner, what would Brunzell discard then? If he pitches a spade or a diamond, it would cost two tricks, and a low-club discard would let declarer establish either the spades or the diamonds safely.

Accordingly, Brunzell switched to a low club at trick six, and West’s nine drove out declarer’s jack. Declarer duly cashed dummy’s spade king, as West threw a heart, and then took the heart king, on which Brunzell discarded his club ace! South now cleared the spades, hoping the defensive communications were broken. But since Brunzell could reach his partner with his carefully retained low club, West had a winning club and heart to cash for two down.

Bid with the aces

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

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