All News

         

The tale of two singleton black 7’s!

At two of the four tables in the recent Mixed Trial, East- West made their contract of 5D, once doubled and once with an overtrick. Should this be so? Let’s see what you would do as declarer in this situation:

 

You may criticise West (when you see their hand) for bidding 4. 1 promised at least a 5 card suit and 3 was pre-emptive. That bid encouraged North to bid 5. They may have done so had West passed 4.

West led K and East followed with 8, a count card, with the defence playing reverse signals. At trick 2, West switched to the K. Declarer won and drew trumps in three rounds, West starting off with 3 diamonds. After playing 2 at trick 2, East discarded 3 and a low spade.  Where to go from here?

This deal is interesting in the defence and play to 5 and the defence should West be allowed to play in 4. At one of the other tables, West did indeed bid and make 4. Let’s check out the 4 hands:

 

Were you defending a small slam holding both a side-suit ace along with a singleton in another side-suit, it would almost always be incorrect to lead your singleton after cashing your ace. Logically, if partner does hold the ace opposite your singleton, you are most likely to beat the contract by going passive. The lead of a singleton usually carries a great risk as it can destroy partner’s honour holding in the suit.

It is the same here. The switch to the club singleton was both extremely dangerous and of course, there was an alternative K switch. If the defence had a club trick, it would seem they would make it along with a heart trick. The club switch here proved immediately fatal for the defence.

Of course, West had deduced their partner had an odd number of spades. Where that was three, West needed to continue that suit. Yet, declarer wins, draws trumps and concedes a club, making 11 tricks. So, West here did well to switch, but not to the 7 as now South makes an overtrick.

Making game..or not!

So, K switch beats 5? Well, if declarer wins and plays the top two clubs after drawing trumps, then 5 will go down a trick. Should that be the case?

Back to South who received the K lead and K switch. They should certainly draw three rounds of trumps and then should take stock. They too should realise that the lead of a king against a high level contract (the 5 level or higher) often/ maybe always asks for count not attitude. South knows West started with 5 hearts and therefore East with 4. Since West would have opened 1 had they been 5-5 in the majors, they should deduce that West had 4 spades and East 5.

So, since West started with 4 spades and 5 hearts and had 3 confirmed diamonds, it should become much clearer how to play the club suit. So small to K and then finesse? No way! That would block the club suit and all the good counting would be for nothing. South must play J (or 10) to the K and then finesse, preserving 3 as the way to get to dummy and discard the losing heart…. making an overtrick! Yes! Great counting and play. Let’s hope the declarer in 5 who made the overtrick did indeed do that rather than being “given” the contract by West playing their singleton at trick 2.

The other black singleton

What then of the table where 4 made? That just should not have happened after K lead from North. The singleton diamond in dummy would be a big disappointment to South. The winning defence, though, is in their hands and should not be left to North to guess. South should overtake with A at trick 1 and switch to their singleton 7. Yes, this time such a switch would be necessary.

Either North has a spade trick or else South can get a ruff. A wins the first trick and North plays 6. With 2 and 5 not in view, South may be able to read that as not encouraging (reverse attitude) signal. Thus, when West plays Q, South must take emergency action. The only way to partner’s hand would be in clubs and the only way to beat the contract is an immediate low club to partner’s K. If West has 2 clubs, so much the better but getting the ruff is more important. Not guaranteed success and absolute failure when West’s club is the singleton king and North held K. Play the odds, though, and South would/ should be rewarded.

The ”cold” 5 was missed but there should be no double game swing as there was in one match. It was mandatory to play one of the black 7's at trick 2 and mandatory for the other one to be withheld.

Richard Solomon

Go Back View All News Items