The Bridge Corner
By Gary Mitchell

Opening Lead: Spade King

The bidding explained: South’s three Heart bid asked North how good his two Heart bid was. With two Aces, North considers his hand a maximum and accepts the invitation to bid game.

The play: Declarer sees two sure losers, one Spade and one Club. So, one of the two finesses in the red suits has to work. However, there are only two entries to dummy, so there can only be two finesses. Should you finesse in Hearts or Diamonds? This is not a guess, one line of play is correct and the other is wrong, regardless of the outcome.

If you finesse in Hearts, and the finesse succeeds, you still lose if Hearts are 4-1. You will still have a Heart loser even though the finesses work. However, if you finesse twice in Diamonds, and the finesses work, you can pull trump from your hand, giving up only one Heart trick, even if they break 4-1. Even if the Diamond finesse loses, you can still finesse the Hearts once, and then hope for East to have started with a doubleton King of Hearts. This is much more likely than East having a doubleton King of Diamonds, which you will need if the Heart finesse loses.

Questions: email me at gary@smabridge.com . Lessons: Call 152-6351.