BRIDGE
Your support helps us to tell the story
From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.
At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.
The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.
Your support makes all the difference.It seemsimpossible that a defender could be put under pressure when all of his remaining cards are in the same suit, but this deal illustrates the so-called "one suit squeeze" well.
West opened Two Hearts and East gave the negative response of Two No- trumps. South bid a firm Four Spades and West passed, having described his hand well already, and East was not prepared to join in the party. West started with two top diamonds against Four Spades and declarer ruffed.
With the ace of hearts surely wrong, the main chance seemed to be a 3- 3 club break. However, there was nothing to be lost by getting a count of the hand first. Declarer drew two rounds of trumps, crossed to the queen of clubs, and ruffed a diamond high. At this point West had shown up with three diamonds, two spades and (from his opening bid) six hearts. It was clear that the clubs were not breaking. The only hope lay in an end-play in hearts. South played off the rest of his trumps, throwing a club and a diamond from dummy, and cashed the ace and king of clubs.
The position with three cards to play was that dummy held H743 and declarer HK52; West had to find a discard from HAQJ6. If he parted with the six, declarer would play a low heart from each hand to throw West in, so West discarded his jack. Now declarer led a low heart from dummy and covered East's eight with the king. West won but had to concede the last trick to dummy's seven of hearts. If, at the start, you had placed a bet on which card would win trick 13, you would probably have lost your money...
LOVE ALL: dealer West
North
] 6 3
_ 7 4 3
+ 9 7 4 3
[ K Q 8 4
West East
] 7 4 ] 9 5 2
_ A Q J 10 9 6 _ 8
+ A K Q + 10 8 6 5 2
[ 6 2 [ J 10 9 3
South
] A K Q J 10 8
_ K 5 2
+ J
[ A 7 5
Join our commenting forum
Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies
Comments