17th March – Board 3: East/West Game. Dealer South.
An opportunity to dine out on a perfect defence arose on the deal shown below after East/West refused to be bludgeoned into submission. I don’t know how the actual bidding went but I do know that the final contract was 5HX and I guess it could have gone something like:
 |
West
|
North
|
East
|
South
|
No
| |||
1H
|
1S
|
2H
|
2S
|
4H
|
4S
|
No
|
No
|
5H
|
No
|
No
|
Dbl
|
End
|
I think that 2H bid is justified if only because it takes room away from South who is a little on the heavy side for 2S but not strong enough to make an Unassuming Cue Bid of 3H. When one side reaches a high level without a huge amount of points it is more or less mandatory for the opposition to kick off their defence with a trump lead in order to cut down declarer’s cross-ruffing potential, but here that clearly cannot be done. However on the fairly routine lead of the king of spades South should overtake with the ace and lead a trump. Declarer can win and ruff a diamond in dummy and does best to ruff a club back to hand and advance the nine of spades. However North must have nerves of steel and duck, playing his partner for the ten who can win the trick and play another trump. Only by doing this can the defence stop declarer from making two ruffs in dummy.
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