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The successful finesse.

The Successful Line.

We would all like to find it, especially on troublesome deals like today’s one. This deal produced many casualties in the qualifying rounds of last weekend’s South Island Pairs.

 

South opened a Multi 2 which included a balanced 20-21 or 19 with a 5-card suit, as evidenced above. After West’s overcall, South was careful not to bid 2 which might sound like a Weak 2. North checked for a 5-card major with 3 and South announced then their 5-card spade suit.

4 was the popular contract and a small trump was the popular lead. What is your proposed line?

At some tables but by no means all, West had overcalled. West had sometimes overcalled a 1 opening, sometimes not. Where West had remained silent, one option was to play for the A to be with East. Win J at trick 1 and play a heart towards the king. If that scores, give up a heart and ruff one, losing just a heart and two diamonds.

That line seemed almost doomed where West had overcalled. So, another approach could be to win J and play on diamonds, hoping for a well-placed Q. Again, chances of that being successful were not great. West was favourite to hold that card.

Both the above lines were doomed to failure. A few declarers received help from West in the form of a club lead or switch from West and scraped home. One declarer found a successful route surprisingly after West had remained silent.

The trump lead, a very good one for the defence, suggested West held defensive values, aces, perhaps even AQs. If that was the case, it would be a good idea to keep East off lead for as long as possible:

 

Note West's silence. 

This South won the opening lead in hand and cashed a second high spade, maybe taking away a safe exit card from West (though here West did hold 3 trumps). Next came A and a second club to the king in dummy, to be followed by J. It would not have helped East to cover. They ducked and South discarded a small heart.

Declarer then turned their attention to the diamond suit and played a diamond to 10. West was caught. They won Q and exited with the third round of trumps to dummy’s J. A second small diamond to K followed. That left West with only hearts and A continuation ensured South had 10 tricks.

When in with Q, West could have cashed A before exiting though South would then play K under the ace and have a discard on the fourth round of diamonds to dispose of a second heart.

Had West more diamonds, they could exit in the suit but still leaving J9 high in dummy to provide one useful discard.

There was nothing certain about the lie of the East-West honours, though leaving J in dummy and playing clubs in the above manner seemed a very reasonable and ultimately successful approach. West could equally have held Q as Q though on this day, the ruffing club finesse was the successful approach.

Those few declarers who tried 3NT found no joy especially where East on lead found 9 at trick 1. This contract should surely be defeated anyway though on that lead was so very quickly.

Richard Solomon

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