The Best Option

By Heather Dhondy

Dealer: South N/S Vul.     J 9 8     A K Q J 9 7     10     J 10 9     Q 6 5     6 5 3     A J 7 6     A K 4

Playing teams, South opens 1NT and West passes. What do you respond with the North cards?

With your running suit, 3NT is certainly a consideration and a likely winning action at pairs since the same number of tricks may well be available in 4. However, there is a small risk that one of the remaining suits may be unguarded. As you are playing teams, you decide that it may be safer to play in 4 and it looks better to have the lead come round to partner's hand, so you choose to transfer to hearts and then raise to four.

Now take the South seat. The lead is the 3; you see the dummy, and wish you were in 3NT. However you must focus on your contract of 4. How do you plan the play?

You have nine top tricks and a club finesse or spade guess will give you ten. However, the spade suit looks like one that we would much prefer the opposition to broach than have to play ourselves. Is there a way to guarantee this contract?

You can only guarantee the contract if the trumps break 2-2. If they do, you will be able to eliminate diamonds and throw the opponents in with the third round of clubs, whilst still holding a trump in each hand. However, in order to do this, you will need to begin by ruffing a diamond at trick two. You can then draw trumps, cross to hand with a club, ruff a diamond, cross back with a club and ruff your last diamond. This leaves you in this position:

J 9 8     Q     -     J     Q 6 5     6     -     4

Now you put the defence on lead with your last club, and they will have to open up the spades for you, or concede a ruff-and-discard. Either way you will have your tenth trick.

By playing the contract in this way, you have not given up on the other chances. If the trumps do not break, you can now try the club finesse. If that fails, you may still have time to guess the spades for your contract unless trumps are 4-0, since West will probably not be able to attack diamonds as the lead would suggest that he holds the remaining honour.

This was the full deal:

Dealer: South. E/W Vul.     J 9 8   A K Q J 9 7   10   J 10 9     K 4 3   8 2   K 9 8 3 2   Q 5 2   A 10 7 2   10 4   Q 5 4   8 7 6 3     Q 6 5   6 5 3   A J 7 6   A K 4

If the trumps had been 4-0 and the club finesse had failed, you may have wished that you had not ruffed the diamond at trick two since you would be unlikely now to be able to take a successful view in spades. However, a 2-2 break is significantly more likely than a 4-0 break, and this makes it worth the small risk to guarantee your contract.

You may have thought that you would bid 4 believing it to be a safer contract than 3NT at teams. This deal shows that this is not always the case, and I think that when you hold a running six-card suit, as here, and minimum values for game, you should give serious consideration to calling no-trumps.

Heather's Hints

1. Whenever you have a two-way guess in a side-suit, consider if you can eliminate the other suits and put the opponents in to open up the suit for you.
2. Always try to keep open as many of your options as possible during the play. If you are one trick short, a finesse is nearly always the last thing you should try if all else fails.
3. Consider taking a ruff at trick two when playing in a long trump suit before drawing trumps. It can be useful for either eliminating side suits, as here, or reducing your trumps to effect a trump coup.