The Bridge Corner
By Gary Mitchell

The bidding explained: North’s rebid of 1NT promised a balanced/semi-balanced hand of 13-14 points. Armed with that information, South decides that he is a brilliant card player and overbids a little. A 3S bid would have described the hand better.

The play: Declarer puts in the 10, which wins. East should not cover with the Queen, as South must have the King, and there is no point in helping Declarer. Declarer sees only two Diamond losers and a possible trump loser. So, being the brilliant card player that he is, he immediately takes the Spade finesse. It loses, West returns a Diamond to East. A Heart return is trumped and another Diamond winner taken for down one. No, I won’t say it again! Yes I will! No, I won’t!

North opened the bidding with a Heart. Why didn’t West lead a Club or Diamond? The bidding screamed for a minor suit lead. When the defenders do something strange, beware. You can afford two Diamond losers and one Spade loser. At trick two, play a Spade to the Ace. If nothing good happens, go to dummy with a Club and lead another Spade. If Spades are 2-2, or 3-1 with East having the third, you are okay. If West started with the KJ9 of Spades, you were never making this anyway. 

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