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In Declarer’s Shoes.

Can you be? Can you anticipate what is happening and what as a defender you should be doing? There’s not much to go on…or is there?

 

The bidding is all natural. South has 5+ spades by virtue of their opening bid. When South offered a choice of games with 2NT, North went for the 9 as opposed to 10 trick game. You lead 6 and see 9 played from dummy, J from your partner and K from the declarer. Next comes 2 from South. Are you planning your defence?

There are two important inferences to draw from the bidding and play so far. Our West drew one but one was not enough. They played low to the 7 ….and the defence was all over! East won their A and switched to a low club but that did not bother South:

 

They won to play Q forcing out your king. Back came a second heart ducked to the Q but East had no entry left after the A was forced out and declarer could now count to 9…2 tricks in three suits along with three spade tricks. Opportunity lost because you had found a great opening lead, much more challenging than 4^th highest of your longest and not that strong diamond suit…even better than a club though South will be challenged if East finds 7 at trick 1, as they should.  Yet, you had not taken advantage of the favourable situation for the defence.

West did guess that South was missing the A but was afraid  their partner’s A were it singleton might fall on the same trick if they went up with K on the first round of the suit: i.e. that South had six spades. This was possible and indeed some would have opened a strong 1NT with the South hand. (Either our South could not or else chose to upgrade their 17 count with a 5 card suit to 18.) West had still to imagine they had hit on a good lead though the minors did not seem to offer much hope for the defence. Assuming South had a maximum three hearts, the best chance for West was to assume that their partner held both the Q and A. Go up with K and cross your fingers that partner’s singleton ace does not win the trick! If it does, then you had a great plan which would be right for another day. As you can see, that day was this day!

A second round of hearts while your partner still held A would have beaten the contract. Put yourself in declarer’s shoes. If South held A why would you not play one of dummy’s red aces and then play a spade towards their hand, taking a finesse?

So, West had worked out where the A was but not the fact that South almost certainly had only five spades….and only two or three hearts. There were plenty of inferences to draw from the brief bidding sequence and play so far. Opportunity lost.

In theory, North-South had reached the wrong game because 4 can always be made, “can” being the key word. No problems on a diamond lead from West and plenty of problems on a club (East does best to insert 7 at trick 1) or a heart lead. With 2 spades and a club to lose, South needs to play K then J in order then to be successful. No doubt losing to doubleton Q8 in the East hand would not then feel that good! Where the defence do not attack clubs, declarer can afford to lose to the Q ( low to the jack)  and will be able to discard their club loser on the 9 on the fourth round of the suit.

A few did beat 3NT after a heart lead and others made 4 but without help from the defence, that was no easy contract.

More on Friday for our JIN Club members.

Richard Solomon

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