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Make them vanish!

Ruff Away

If you have not got enough top tricks to cash in your suit contract, then using your trumps separately to create extra tricks seems a good way to try to make your contract. When most of your trumps are above the level of the opposition’s, then your chance of success is good.

Ten. That’s the number of tricks you need to make your contract. You raised to game because your honours, apart from jacks, seemed to be in the right suits. However, partner’s clubs were not what you would have hoped for.

No time for dreaming. West has led 3 and you need 10 tricks, at least!

A nice 5-card club suit headed by the KQ would have seen you embark on a different line. However, not today. We have three side-suit tricks, maybe 4 if West has led away from the Q and diamonds break 4-3. That break occurs 62% of the time and so with the finesse working as well, that is just 31% of the time and if the finesse loses, and the opposition switch to a trump, we are not in good shape to score ruffs. We still have to lose a spade before ruffing can start.

If we rise with A, we need to score 7 trump tricks to come to 10 tricks. We would prefer the K to be in the finesse position and therefore with East. We want to ruff four clubs in hand and therefore only need a couple of spade ruffs as we can make one of dummy’s trumps perforce once the K has been played.

So, rise with the A, play a club to the ace and play J. These were the four hands:  

 

Realistically, West cannot afford to duck this as South could easily hold QJ10. So, West wins to play a second diamond. You win K and start on your cross-ruff.

Ruff a club and then a spade, a second club and a second spade. That is 7 tricks so far. So, you play a fourth round of clubs and when East produces K, throw your J on that. You still have 2 trumps in each hand and only need to make 3 tricks from them.

When East now plays a trump, you have a decision. Taking the A is now probably best even when the K does not fall so conveniently. Without seeing the king fall, you would hope to ruff a spade and then playing dummy’s last diamond would ensure you one more trick in the cross-ruff.

Had South over-ruffed the K, the contract would fail as the defence could cash Q with East making one of their small trumps at trick 13. Discarding the losing diamond was a variation on throwing a loser on a loser. As stated, trying to score 3 diamond tricks by finessing at trick 1 would not be successful even with the J scoring. You only ever had two diamond tricks.

One other line which would have been successful here would have been taking two ruffing club finesses against East. Twice East has to cover and with South down to AQ, there would be a good case for laying down A with three trumps still remaining in dummy. That line could even have produced an overtrick on a deal where most declarers recorded a minus score.

 

Win them early!

Although the lines stated above do not guarantee success, they seem to offer the best chances of success even where there is not a 4-1 trump break. What is clear is that you should cash your side suit aces and kings before embarking on the cross-ruff. In doing that, taking a first-round diamond finesse would prove unwise with the contract almost certainly failing if the Q had been with East. 

Oh dear!

Overbidding again! “ That’s a lovely dummy” you lie to partner as their 10 pointer hits the deck. The old phrase about drawing trumps and claiming does not seem much of a possibility here.

However, it’s no time to start a post-mortem just yet into why you have found such a terrible contract. As they, the wise folk of bridge say ”You are not down yet.”

 So, what's to be done? Oh , they have led 8.

Can the post-mortem be a happy one?

Richard Solomon

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