bridge
bridge
North-South vulnerable. South deals.
NORTH
x4 3
u9 7 4 3 2
v7 3 2
wA Q 4
WEST EAST
xQ 10 9 7 6 2 xA J 8 5
uK uQ 6
vQ J 10 8 v4
w10 9 wJ 8 7 5 3 2
SOUTH
xK
uA J 10 8 5
vA K 9 6 5
wK 6
The bidding:
SOUTH WEST NORTH EAST
1u 1x 2u 4x
5u Pass Pass Pass
Opening lead: Ten of x
If possible, choose to lose your tricks at an opportune time. It might be crucial to winning or losing your contract.
A competitive auction ended with South bidding five hearts. There is an old precept that the five-level belongs to your opponents, but East-West were wise to sell out for another reason. Even if the sacrifice cost only 300 points, North-South would still have another chance to win the rubber!
East won the opening lead with the ace of spades, noting declarer’s king, and shifted to his singleton diamond. Declarer won with the ace, cashed the ace of trumps and, when both defenders followed focused his attention on avoiding a diamond loser. That could be accomplished if the defender with the remaining high trump also held no more than two diamonds.
The king, ace and queen of clubs were cashed, declarer discarding a diamond from hand. Next, a spade was ruffed in the closed hand and the ace of diamonds was played off, revealing the 4-1 split. East chose not to ruff the high diamond, but that only postponed the inevitable by a trick. Declarer exited with a trump and East was helpless. Left with nothing but black cards, no matter which card East returned declarer could ruff in hand while discarding the table’s remaining diamond. Since dummy was now down to nothing but trumps, declarer claimed the rest of the tricks.
2011 Tribune Media Services