Hand of the Week, 4/11/96

This week's hand is modified from a hand which arose last Saturday game at the International House bridge club.

Your hand is S: KT5 H: 642 D: AJT97 C: AK. Your right-hand opponent dealt and opens the bidding with 1H. You can't make a takeout double on this shape, and you can't overcall 1NT without a heart stopper, so you overcall 2D. Left-hand opponent makes a negative double (showing some values and length in the unbid suits), your partner passes, and your right-hand opponent bids 2H. You pass, and your left-hand opponent bids 2NT, which becomes the final contract.

Partner obediently leads a diamond -- the five, in fact -- and dummy hits the table:

					Dummy
					S: QT6
					H: AQJT84
					D: K6
					C: Q3
			You
			S: KT5
			H: 962
			D: AJT97
			C: AK

It's often a good idea to think about the hand while dummy is being tabled. Are you defeating this contract? If things go well, it looks like you will be able to take four diamonds and two clubs. However, if declarer has the king of hearts and the ace of spades, he will be able to take eight top tricks -- six hearts, a spade, and a diamond. Defenders should always think positively, so you should assume that partner will have one of those two key cards; based on the bidding, partner is most likely to have the king of hearts.

To make sure that you defeat the contract, there are a number of things you need to do -- subtleties. Let's go through them one by one:

1. PLAY TO TRICK ONE. Try to visualize declarer's diamond holding. Since he bid 2NT, he certainly has the guarded queen. Partner's lead of the five is most likely high from 5x, so declarer probably has Q8xx. If declarer plays dummy's king, you will of course win the ace; but what if dummy plays low? If you play the ace, declarer will now have two diamond stoppers; hence you should play the nine in this case (play the lower from touching cards), tempting declarer to take his diamond trick while your partner still has a diamond.
2. THE EARLY PLAY. Suppose that declarer ducks from both hands on trick one, so that your nine holds the trick. Clearly on trick two you should kill the diamond king with your ace. What should you do on trick three? Your partner will hopefully get in with the king of hearts, but he won't have any diamonds left at that point, so it is imperative that knows to lead a club when he gets in. One way of letting him know this is to play the *king of clubs* at trick three. Once this wins the trick, partner will know that you hold the ace of clubs, and so he will lead a club if he gets in. After the king of clubs holds, you will of course drive out declarer's queen of diamonds.
3. OTHER OPTIONS. If you didn't find the play of the club king on trick three, there are other ways you can tell partner to lead a club when he gets in.
   • DIAMOND CARDING. Since the nine won the first trick, partner can assume once declarer wins the queen that you have both the ten and the jack, as otherwise declarer would not have let your nine hold. Consequently, partner can read a suit preference message out of the third diamond you play. You are known to have both the ten and jack, so you'd play the jack if you wanted a spade return, and the ten if you wanted a club return.
   • HEART CARDING. Consider the heart position. Declarer most likely has a singleton, so hopefully partner has Kxx; even if partner has only Kx, your count signal in hearts will never affect his choice of plays. Therefore, instead of giving count in hearts, you can play your hearts in such a way so as to give suit preference, Playing the nine, then the six, then the two would tell partner that you like the higher suit, spades; playing your hearts in the reverse order tells him that you like clubs.

The complete hand:

				S: 432
				H: K73
				D: 54
				C: 76542
		S: AJ98				S: QT6
		H: 5				H: AQJT84
		D: Q832				D: K6
		C: JT98				C: Q3
				S: K75
				H: 962
				D: AJT97
				C: AK