Better Play Hard

(1) 2NT = At least 5-5 in hearts and diamonds

Your partner made two penalty-oriented doubles, but you did not like your void in hearts, so you bid 3♠, after which your partner drove your side to the spade slam. West leads the ♦K. What is your plan for making this contract?

Solution

As usual, declarer could count 11 tricks against any distribution and 12 if the trumps were an unlikely 3-2. After winning the first trick with dummy’s ♦A, declarer played the ♠K and ♠A, getting the bad news that East had a trick in the suit. Declarer ruffed a diamond then cashed the ♣K. The ♣Q was overtaken with the ace. When West discarded a diamond, declarer paused to think. It was clear from the auction that East had longer hearts than diamonds. Otherwise, he would have bid 3♦ instead of 3♥. Declarer surmised that West began with 1=5=6=1 shape and East with 4=3=2=4 distribution. So, declarer cashed the ♠Q and played two more rounds of clubs, reducing everyone to four cards. Declarer now played his last club. East threw a heart because he saw that there was no point in ruffing. If he did ruff, he would have had to lead a heart, allowing declarer to take the last three tricks with two hearts and a trump. Discarding, however, that served only to delay his fate. Declarer now led a trump, throwing dummy’s remaining low heart. East got his trump trick but dummy’s ♥A and ♥Q took the last two tricks. If West had followed to the second club, he would have been marked with 1=5=5=2 shape, so a second diamond could then have been ruffed safely in dummy. The ♥A would have taken care of declarer’s last diamond and all declarer would have lost would have been a trump trick.

The full deal: