Faint Hearted

18th August – Board 20: Game All. Dealer West.

You cannot afford to just sit there at the bridge table and assume the worst when in fact a more pro-active approach can reap dividends – especially in the pairs game when you sometimes have to move Heaven and Earth to get a good score. Take the hand shown below for example where at a number of tables South was strangely silent, although I think the bidding should go something like the following:

West	North	East	South
1H	No	3S	4D
4H	No	No	4S
5H	5S	Dbl	End

3S is a splinter of course showing a limited raise to 4H with a singleton or void spade. (I’m not totally convinced that it wouldn’t be better to bid 2C instead, as splintering with an ace is not usually a good thing.) However after the splinter South has an easy bid, I think, of 4D with a view to bidding 4S later. Why? Well partner is going to be really short in hearts and therefore extremely likely to have a fit in one of South’s main suits. What happens after 4S is a little speculative, but even if North passes 5H he will now surely lead a diamond and hold declarer to eleven tricks when at the table most made twelve. Several North’s led a trump but I am not a fan of leading a singleton trump as it usually carves up partner’s holding of Qxx. It is worth noting that even 5H fails on a club lead and a diamond switch while at the very worst 5S is only down two. And even vulnerable 500 is less than 620.