Deadly Duplication

18th September – Board 5. North/South Game. Dealer North.

Even without the duplimate machine the hands were wildly exciting and none more so than this hand which could have easily ended in tears.

	North: S A 7 H A K J 9 D Q J 8 5 2 C A 5
West: S 9 8 6 5 3 2 H Q 7 6 3 D 10 6 C 2		East: S J 10 4 H 10 4 2 D K 7 4 3 C 10 8 7
	South: S K Q H 8 5 D A 9 C K Q J 9 6 4 3

West	North	East	South
	2C	No	2D
No	2NT	No	4NT
No	5S	No	7NT
End

Once North shows a balanced 19/20 count South is only interested in how many aces his partner holds and an easy way to do that is to have 4NT as ordinary Blackwood! If you want to make a quantitative raise then why not use 4S which otherwise has no meaning at all. 7NT is not a good contract though, requiring a successful finesse in one of the rounded suits but in fact declarer cannot go wrong. The reason the contract is so bad of course is because of the dreadful duplication in spades. Only two tricks despite holding the top three honours. As in the following hand one must have sympathy with the opposition who were victims of circumstance and hardly merited such a poor result.