Bridge

North-South were playing Support Doubles (where a double by South on the first round would have shown any hand with three-card heart support). South’s 2D rebid therefore denied three-card heart support and North decided to bid game in diamonds without further ado. A reasonable alternative was to bid 3S at his second turn. South would then have bid 3NT, which is an easy make. How would you play the diamond game when West leads the two of spades to the ace and East returns a low spade? Were you tempted to make the nothing’ play of inserting the ten? Do that and you would go down! You would use up an entry to dummy prematurely. To make the contract, you must rise with the king of spades. You then cash the ace of hearts and finesse the queen of trumps successfully. Your aim now is to set up a long heart. You ruff a heart and play a trump to the ace, East showing out. A second heart ruff is followed by a spade ruff with dummy’s last trump. You then ruff a fourth round of hearts. It makes no difference whether West overruffs with his master trump or discards on the trick. Either way, you will be able to cross to dummy with the ace of clubs and discard your club loser on the heart that you have established.

Answer

With 11 points you should look for some bid that will invite a game. Here, with three cards in partner’s first suit, you have an easy rebid of 3D. It is not so good to bid the fourth suit (2H). If partner has a heart stop, and values to spare for his opening, he will bid 3NT over your jump preference bid of 3D. Awards: 3D — 10, 2NT/2H — 6, 2S — 3.

David Bird — Knight Features

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