Bridge Match 3 - Board 21

Board 21 - Dealer North - NS Vul

Opponents convention card: Bridge World Standard
Opponents playing strength: Good

My hand: ♠ A T 9 4 ♥ 8 5 4 3 ♦ 9 4 2 ♣ 5 4

East opens 1 heart in second chair. My hand sure is bad, so it looks like this is a hand where I sit back and hope they bid too much. They bid all the way to 6 hearts. I sure hope my 4 little hearts complicate things for them!

I decide to go aggro and lead the A of spades. (THE ACE OF SPADES!)

WEST ♠ K Q J 6 2 ♥ K Q T ♦ K ♣ J 9 7 3
	SOUTH ♠ A T 9 4 ♥ 8 5 4 3 ♦ 9 4 2 ♣ 5 4

West	North	East	South
	Pass	1♥	Pass
2NT1	Pass	3NT2	Pass
4NT3	Pass	5♣4	Pass
6♥	Pass	Pass	Pass
13+ hearts, game forcing
215-17 points, no singleton or void
3Ace asking for hearts
40 or 3 aces

A-2-8-7. East should have all the other aces. Partner played his highest spade, and he sure doesn't have an honour, so it's entirely possible he has a singleton. I know East has at least 2 spades so partner has at most 2 of them. I see no compelling reason to try for anything other than a ruff here, so I'll play a second spade. 4-J-3-5. Oh well.

Declarer draws some trump. T-6-2-3. Q-7 of diamonds-7-4. K-3 of diamonds-A-5. 9-8-3 of clubs-5 of diamonds. Declarer now should have at least 1 club trick, 2 diamonds, 3 spades, and another heart to go with his 5 tricks already taken. That's 12. He has the entries available by playing a diamond to the K, cash the spades, then a club back to cash the diamond ace.

He does exactly that. Making 6.

	NORTH ♠ 8 3 ♥ 6 ♦ J T 8 7 6 5 3 ♣ K Q 2
WEST ♠ K Q J 6 2 ♥ K Q T ♦ K ♣ J 9 7 3		EAST ♠ 7 5 ♥ A J 9 7 2 ♦ A Q ♣ A T 8 6
	SOUTH ♠ A T 9 4 ♥ 8 5 4 3 ♦ 9 4 2 ♣ 5 4

All of the other tables played 4 hearts. 3 of them made 6, 3 of them made 5, one of them even went down 1. So we get a flat bottom board here. If I lead a club then we set up a second trick when I get in with my spade ace. A diamond cuts communication. So I pretty much let them make with the spade lead. But it only really goes bad when West has 5 solid spades and it was one of the ways to potentially set them if partner had a stiff. So West needed exactly 5 spades since 4 wouldn't be enough tricks and 6 would mean partner could ruff. Oh well.


Captain Jack agrees with me all the way! He also agrees with me that we got unlucky that only our opponent bid slam. Boo!

Ranking after board 21/60: 7/16 with 52.72%