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5 by South |
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Last Newsletter you were asked to analyse the following two hands on a double dummy basis. They weren't easy:
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What lead sets the contract?
Declarer has two possible routes to an 11th trick to accompany
4 diamonds, 5 trumps and 
A. He can
either ruff a 2nd heart in hand, or establish the 13th spade. The
former plan requires entries to dummy, but the latter needs a
late entry to hand. The key to the defence is to force declarer
in hearts at just the right time.
It was shown last Newsletter that a dummy reversal is
successful on a heart lead - declarer ruffs and leads a small
diamond, establishing 
J as a second
entry along with A, enabling him to ruff
a 2nd heart, cash KQ and enter dummy to
draw A.
So what other leads are possible? A diamond is immediately
fatal. Q enables declarer to establish
J, while a small spade to partner's
K leaves partner unable to continue the
suit. If he leads a heart the dummy reversal works as before,
while if the defence play to Q and
continue diamonds declarer can draw trumps, cash A, throw a spade on the diamonds and ruff the spades
good, still having a heart ruff as an entry to hand. If East
switches to a trump at trick 2, declarer wins in hand and leads a
small diamond, and again the defence have the choice of forcing
with a heart, permitting the dummy reversal, or exiting passively
enabling the spades to be ruffed out.
So we are left with a trump lead. If 7 is led, dummy covers with 8, West
must play 9 to deny dummy a free entry
(else the play continues heart ruff, small diamond etc), but now
declarer can later afford to overtake a club honour as another
entry, as dummy's 6 suffices to draw the
3rd round of trumps.
Only the lead of J defeats the
contract! Declarer wins in hand, and if he ducks a diamond, the
defence continue diamonds. Declarer now ducks a spade to East,
but now a heart force kills the late entry to the 13th spade. If
South leads a spade at trick 2, the defence wins and continues
spades.
I found this hand very hard to analyse.
Secondly, you were defending 4 as
East below:
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The bidding was
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West leads 2 to your king. How can
you set the contract?
It looks natural to return a trump, but it's not hard to see
what will happen. Declarer plays off all 7 trumps and we are
forced to keep Jxx else he can overtake
K. If we come down to two red aces
declarer cashes K and throws us in with
a red card, and we have to give dummy the last two tricks. In
practice, we would throw A keeping a low
heart, hoping partner has Q10, but of
course double dummy we know he hasn't.
So suppose we force dummy with A at
trick 2? Declarer must immediately play AQ, throwing a diamond and then a third club throwing another
diamond. If West throws Q on this trick,
trying for a trump promotion, it is at the cost of a natural
heart trick. So instead, we must lead a low heart at trick 2.
This is the position after declarer cashes AQ:
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If a diamond is led, East wins and plays A and another heart. Or on a third round of clubs, if South
throws a loser West throws his last heart. East now leads
A and if this wins a 3rd heart. West
scores J via a trump promotion.
Note that we cannot afford to cash even one diamond before leading a heart, else in the diagram, declarer can get back to hand with a diamond ruff.
It might be possible to work all this out at the table, but I'd be very pleased with myself if I did.
So while we're in an analytic mood let's consider the hand from the front cover. The auction is something on the lines of
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What's the best lead? Looking at all four hands, it's natural
to choose a spade, but see what happens. AK are cashed, pitching a diamond, followed by a spade ruff,
AK throwing a diamond and a club ruff
and a spade ruff. South is now on lead in the following
position:
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Needing 4 tricks, South crosses to table with A and leads J. If 9 is allowed to score South exits with a loser
and makes AQ by means of the endplay. So
East does best to ruff with 10, but
South discards Q. East exits with
2 and South wins with Q (NOT 9!) and leads a diamond.
East must ruff high and South discards, making 11 tricks.
So what is the best lead? You guessed it - a diamond sets the
contract, by denying declarer the late entry to table. I did in
fact lead a diamond against 4X at the
table, and declarer misplayed the hand to go one off. Afterwards,
I apologised to partner for my poor choice, not realising I'd
found the only lead to prevent the overtrick! If only partner
would stop doubling with such feeble trumps.
An unlikely entry - Anon
We've all defended hands where dummy is packed with winners but is completely entryless; then out of the blue, we're forced to give it the last trick, usually to declarer's surprise and pleasure. In a recent Cambs-Suffolk ECL match I was stunned by the most unlikely entry I have ever seen. See if you can predict which of North's cards will provide an entry at trick 9...
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I led 2, which dummy won with
9, partner showing an odd number,
marking declarer with a 2-4-5-2 shape. Chris Chambers of Suffolk
now led a low spade to the Q and K which I ducked. I won the
spade continuation and cashed AQ,
declarer throwing a diamond. I now led 6
to show partner I held no honours in the suit. Dummy covered with
the 8, partner put in the 10 and
declarer won with Q and led 7. I covered with 9,
dummy played the J and partner won with
K and switched to K. Declarer won with A, grinned
widely, and led the 3 to dummy's
5 while we followed with the 4 and 2
amid general hilarity. Dummy was now high!!
I'm sure I could have defended better, but in some ways I'm glad it happened the way it did. Declarer afterwards commented that this had fulfilled one of his lifelong ambitions.