Neither vulnerable. North deals.

Neither vulnerable. North deals.
NORTH
K
A 9 8 4 3
10 7 6 5
10 7 5
WEST EAST
A 9 8 7 5 Q 10 6
7 5 K J 10 6 2
K 9 3 8
K 4 3 J 9 6 2
SOUTH
J 4 3 2
Q
A Q J 4 2
A Q 8
The bidding:
NORTH EAST SOUTH WEST
Pass Pass 1 1
Dbl 2 3 Pass
Pass 3 Pass Pass
4 Pass Pass Pass
Opening lead: Ace of
The winners of the Whitehead Women's Pairs at the recent Spring North American Championship were several-time world champion Judy Radin and Sylvia Moss, both from New York. This is the second time they have won the event, and this deal helped them on their way.
North's double of the one-spade overcall was negative -- for takeout, not penalties and promising hearts. The rest of the auction was competitive, typical of a duplicate pairs event.
West led the ace of spades and shifted to the seven of hearts. Since declarer needed spade ruffs to come to anything near 10 tricks, declarer, Radin, won with dummy's ace, ruffed a heart in hand and trumped a spade on the table. Next came a club and, when East followed low, declarer made the fine play of inserting the eight from hand! When this fetched the king, declarer's life improved considerably.
West returned a club to declarer's queen. When another spade ruff felled the queen, setting up the jack in declarer's hand, declarer could afford to lead the seven of diamonds to the jack, and West took the king of diamonds -- the last trick for the defense.
& copy;2006 Tribune Media Services
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