ETCETERA; 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.WHEN you reach slam contracts in which you are clearly too high and regretting not playing in a peaceful game, you have to start visualising adverse distributions (however unlikely) that might help you. This was a good example from this year's Generali European Championships.
Both Five Clubs and Three No-trumps would have been straightforward, but more than one South ended in Six Clubs.
After a diamond lead and an inspection of dummy it was clear to declarer that he needed something favourable in order to avoid the loss of a heart and a trump. A singleton king of hearts would help, but there was no rush to try for that - another possibility was to find a defender with the singleton ace of trumps. Dummy's top diamonds were followed by two rounds of spades and a spade ruff. Then South cashed a third top diamond and exited with a trump. West won, and led a heart rather than concede a ruff and discard. South played dummy's ten and now he was home. As you can see, if West had been able to exit peacefully with a second round of trumps, declarer would still have had a chance of dropping the king of hearts.
In defence, the singleton ace of trumps can be a hazard. It's not that you are concerned about not making a trick with it - it's the possibility of being thrown in with it at an unfavourable time that sometimes makes it a good opening lead.
Love all; dealer North
North
] A K 5
_ Q 10 7 2
+ Q J
[ Q J 9 8
West East
] Q 10 8 4 3 ] J 9 7 6
_ J 9 5 3 _ K 6
+ 10 8 3 + 9 6 4 2
[ A [ 10 7 3
South
] 2
_ A 8 4
+ A K 7 5
[ K 6 5 4 2
Join our commenting forum
Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies
Comments