13th October – Board 12: North/South Vul. Dealer West.
East would doubtless feel disappointed if his partner failed to land the slam on the hand shown below but in truth the layout was not kind for declarer.
West
|
North
|
East
|
South
|
1NT
|
No
|
2H
|
No
|
2S
|
No
|
3D
|
No
|
4S
|
No
|
6S
|
End
|
East takes a practical approach when his partner shows positive spade support with West unable to hold enough ‘right’ cards for the grand slam to be viable. However on the normal looking lead of the jack of hearts declarer is faced with a series of guesses. If the diamond finesse is working there is clearly no problem but as long as the defence keep completely passive and fail to open up any other suit declarer will ultimately be faced with the decision of whether to hope for the 3-3 break in diamonds or take a finesse against the ten. My instincts tell me the latter is right but I know I would do the former!
