Bridge - The Scotsman 11/02/2012

BAD breaks can break good contracts, but you should not blame bad luck if you can make your contract anyway. How would you cope here?

Partner’s 2NT indicates a good diamond raise, and your 3NT rebid shows a balanced hand with 15-17 points. Partner might indulge in a little cuebidding, but decides that the grand slam is unlikely and prefers to give no information. North leads the queen of clubs. How would you plan the play?

It looks too easy: draw trumps and finesse spades for the overtrick. What could possibly go wrong? Start by cashing the ace of diamonds in case of a 3-0 trump break – if South shows out you have a marked finesse against North’s Q10x. But it is North who shows out, and you cannot avoid losing a trump trick to Q10x in South. That is unlucky, but a successful spade finesse will compensate. How will you continue?

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Do not rush to take the spade finesse – it will not run away. Cash the king of diamonds, then cross to the ace of spades to take the king of clubs. South appears to be signalling an even number of clubs, though you should not place much reliance on that – defenders do not need to signal against a slam, and should try to be as obscure as possible. Next you cash three hearts – and something surprising happens: North discards a spade on the third round. This means that North has 11 black cards, and South just five. You have already seen South play two clubs and a spade, so he has just two black cards left. There is no point in finessing spades unless his last two black cards are SQx, and how likely is that? North might have mentioned an eight-card club suit in the auction. Your best shot is to forget the spade finesse, cash the king and exit with a diamond to South’s queen. He must give you a ruff and discard for your twelfth trick.

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