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                           Knee-Jerk?

You open the bidding and finish up in 3NT with your partner putting down a 17 count with honours in every suit. You have a 7-card suit of your own. It all seems pretty routine and easy. That, then, is the time you should be extra careful. You do not want to explain to your partner, maybe teammates, how your contract failed!

 

South became declarer in 3NT with what seemed a more than ample dummy. West led 6. Over to you. The K is not singleton.

How did/how could South have failed in 3NT with hands containing so many potential tricks? As you can imagine, as it happens so often, it happened at trick 1.

Almost without thinking, indeed certainly without thinking, South covered the opening lead with one of dummy’s heart honours. Had West led away from the the A, this would not have mattered but would merely have scored an extra overtrick. When East held the A, the cover was a difference between an over and an under trick. Take a look:

 

East returned 10 and South had to start discarding winners. The defenders kept playing hearts until dummy’s other honour was played.

South could then try and score 9 tricks without the use of clubs. However, one heart trick, A, and three tricks in each of the other two suits would only add up to 8. Alternatively, South had to hope East held K, a 50% chance but that was not the case. The defence took 4 heart tricks and K. Embarrassment!

Ducking is best

Well on some days, East may hold 2 and find an extraordinary duck of their partner’s opening lead. Even if that happened, South would never be worse off than by covering with an honour at trick 1. It must be unlikely that West had found a lead from a three-card suit and that East had five hearts…and the K. If that was the situation, then you should be complimenting West on a great initial lead.

As you can see, East could not duck the opening lead had declarer played low from dummy. 8 wins and East could muddy the waters by playing back 10. Once again, declarer ducks from dummy (though on the actual distribution, they could win this trick. It gets kind of boring having to discard winning clubs!)

South’s only real danger is where a defender holds 5 hearts and the K. After ducking twice, the defence above is finished. They will have done well to hold South to 9 tricks as South can win any switch in dummy, cash A and return to hand with an ace to play Q and if the defence do not take the A at that point, they will never make it.

Time to take care

Beware, beware a contract that looks so easy and beware playing the obvious card which you may find is not so obvious after all. This theme is continued in our hand for Tuesday.

A deal for all levels

 

1NT was 15-17. South denied holding a major and was soon trying to make 3NT. West led 5. As declarer, you play low from dummy with East contributing the K. Plan the play.

Richard Solomon

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