Slim Chance Better Than None

Today’s deal occurred in a local duplicate tournament. The North-South assets do not warrant reaching game, but a few pairs nonetheless wandered into four hearts. The temptation to overbid is a disease that afflicts most bridge players (this writer included) from time to time.

The optimistic bidding at one table is shown below. North was clearly the more guilty — a simple preference to two hearts at his second turn would have been wiser; and his final jump to four hearts was a wild gamble.

South deals	Q J 9 8 6 5		West	North	East	South
None vul	J 4 3					1
	K 8 2		Pass	1	Pass	2
	3		Pass	2	Pass	3
10 4 3		A K 7	Pass	4	All Pass
A 5 2		8 7
A J 7 4		10 9 6 5
Q 8 2		J 10 9 7
	2
	K Q 10 9 6
	Q 3
4 South	A K 6 5 4

West made the excellent lead of a low heart in an effort to cut down the dummy’s ruffing power. After winning the heart nine, our South player embarked on an inferior line of play: club ace; club king; club ruff. Stranded in dummy, there was no way to reach the South hand to ruff another club so the contract had to fail.

A clever declarer could have made this hand with proper play, albeit due to a friendly lie of the cards. At trick two a spade should be led to dummy’s eight and East’s king. This leaves the defenders in a predicament. If trumps are cleared, declarer can win the third round in dummy and lead the spade queen for a ruffing finesse; then the diamond king provides an entry to the established spades. If trumps are not led, declarer can also succeed with careful play — leading first to the diamond king; ruffing spade finesse; then crossruffing (or establishing the spades if West wins the diamond ace to lead trumps).

The story contains a moral. When your partner’s overbid (not yours, of course) puts you in a treacherous contract, look for a lie of the enemy cards that will allow you to succeed. Then play on that assumption.

Column 7B07 Main

Top Slim Chance Better Than None

© 1984 Richard Pavlicek