The deal comes from a Bridge Pro Tour individual tournament, held in New York, and the eventual winner, Adam Wildavsky, sat East. South opened with a strong 1NT and North raised to game. How would you play the contract when the eight of hearts is led? There appears to be little interest, wouldn’t you say? You win the heart lead in dummy and play a diamond to the ten. You don’t mind one diamond finesse failing, so long as the next one wins and you score four tricks from the suit, to go with three hearts and two spades. If both diamond honours prove to be with West, you may need a club trick to bring your total to nine. You can see from the diagram that a finesse of the diamond ten will succeed. You return to dummy to finesse the queen of diamonds, scoring ten tricks and indeed that is what happened at most tables of this pairs event. However, Adam Wildavsky tried the effect of playing the king of diamonds on the first round, feigning shortage in the suit. Declarer, despite being a professional player, fell for the trap. He lazily won with the ace of diamonds and continued with the queen. East gained the lead on the third round of diamonds and a low club switch (the jack would not be good enough) gave the defenders four more tricks in clubs. At another table East found the same defence of rising with the king but declarer won, returned to dummy and finessed the diamond ten. Quite right!
Answer
With around 7-9 points it is useful to
respond 1NT over a double. This will allow partner to compete further when he has extra distribution but a minimum in terms of points. He knows that he will find some sort of support, whether he introduces a new suit or rebids his hearts. It is not attractive to respond 1S since the doubler has already suggested that he holds four cards in that suit. Awards: 1NT - 10, 1S - 6, Pass -3.
The deal comes from a Bridge Pro Tour individual tournament, held in New York, and the eventual winner, Adam Wildavsky, sat East. South opened with a strong 1NT and North raised to game. How would you play the contract when the eight of hearts is led? There appears to be little interest, wouldn’t you say? You win the heart lead in dummy and play a diamond to the ten. You don’t mind one diamond finesse failing, so long as the next one wins and you score four tricks from the suit, to go with three hearts and two spades. If both diamond honours prove to be with West, you may need a club trick to bring your total to nine. You can see from the diagram that a finesse of the diamond ten will succeed. You return to dummy to finesse the queen of diamonds, scoring ten tricks and indeed that is what happened at most tables of this pairs event. However, Adam Wildavsky tried the effect of playing the king of diamonds on the first round, feigning shortage in the suit. Declarer, despite being a professional player, fell for the trap. He lazily won with the ace of diamonds and continued with the queen. East gained the lead on the third round of diamonds and a low club switch (the jack would not be good enough) gave the defenders four more tricks in clubs. At another table East found the same defence of rising with the king but declarer won, returned to dummy and finessed the diamond ten. Quite right!
With around 7-9 points it is useful to
respond 1NT over a double. This will allow partner to compete further when he has extra distribution but a minimum in terms of points. He knows that he will find some sort of support, whether he introduces a new suit or rebids his hearts. It is not attractive to respond 1S since the doubler has already suggested that he holds four cards in that suit. Awards: 1NT - 10, 1S - 6, Pass -3.
