BRIDGE

Neither vulnerable. South deals.
NORTH
x J 9 6 4 3
u K
v Q 6 2
w 10 9 7 6
WEST EAST
x A K 7 x Q 10 8 5 2
u 10 8 6 5 2 u 9 4
v J 8 7 4 3 v K 10 5
w Void w 5 4 3
SOUTH
x Void
u A Q J 7 3
v A 9
w A K Q J 8 2
The bidding:
SOUTH WEST NORTH EAST
2w Pass 2v Pass
3w Pass 4w Pass
4u Pass 5H Pass
7w Pass Pass Pass
Opening lead: King of x
The technique of a dummy reversal is simple enough -- you treat the dummy hand as master. Recognizing the possibility of applying the technique is more difficult.
North-South bid well to the optimum spot. After an artificial game force and a waiting response, the rest of the auction was natural. North agreed on the trump suit at the first opportunity. Two heart cue-bids followed, and North decided that a grand slam would be a good bet.
West led the king of spades, and the grand slam was indeed almost laydown. Either a 2-1 trump split or a 4-3 heart break would have allowed declarer to draw trumps, discard the table's diamond losers on hearts and ruff the losing diamond. As the cards lie however, if declarer drew trumps and then started on the hearts, he would have been left with two losers in hand, a diamond and a heart, but only one trump in dummy with which to ruff.
The solution to the problem was to reverse dummy, and to prepare for that, declarer had to take precautions before he knew the exact distribution. South ruffed the opening spade lead high and led the two of clubs to the seven. When West discarded a diamond on this trick, South's careful play bore fruit.
Declarer ruffed another spade high, crossed to the nine of clubs and ruffed a third spade. The king of hearts provided the entry to a fourth spade ruff with declarer's last trump. A heart was trumped on the board, and the last trump was extracted with the ten, declarer discarding his losing diamond. South's hand was now high, and the ace of diamonds was the entry to run the winners and claim the grand slam.
XThis column is written by Tannah Hirsch and Omar Sharif. For information about Charles Goren's newsletter for bridge players, call (800) 788-1225 or write Goren Bridge Letter, P.O. Box 4410, Chicago, Ill. 60680. Send e-mail to gorenbridge@aol.com.
& copy; 2004, Tribune Media Services