January 2010 - 59

Winsome & Loathsome
Make them pay!
We started last year with counting,
the most important playing skill. And,
we start the New Year with counting,
its importance undiminished. We
identified clues that help us count the
opponents' distribution, strength and
available tricks. The first clue comes
from the auction, so listen!
As modern bidding has become
more sophisticated and descriptive,
defense has become correspondingly
more accurate. Even as you describe
your hand to your partner, an accomplished opponent is listening.
Sometimes declarer benefits.
Suppose partner (the Little Despot
in this case) at equal vulnerability
opens 1NT (15-17). Your right-hand
opponent bids 2 for the majors and
you hold:
A 8 6 4 - J 5 4 Q 9 8 6 5 4.
You bid 3, invitational. LHO calls
3; Sharon contributes 4. RHO
drives to game in hearts and you dive

➤ Billy Miller continued
club to clear the suit. We then had
nine tricks when hearts behaved.
Even without the club leads, 3NT was
a superior contract with excellent
chances. 4 was clearly inferior, off
three top tricks plus a possible club
ruff, a second diamond loser and even
a trump loser. We made a 23-point
game. Sweet!
Not only did the gizmo lead to a
great bridge result but it was fun to
use. Even though that opponent didn't
give us a chance to explain the gizmo
at the table, it still gave us a story
that we tell 25 years later, and we still
celebrate that first triumph. That's a
good deal.
r

at five, which is doubled. The 3 is
led and Sharon tables a perfecto:
K 9 5 2 7 5 3 A 6 A K J 10.
What's your plan, man? To begin
with, you know that the spade lead is
a stiff from the auction. So RHO holds
Q J 10 7. So you win in your hand
and play a trump to dummy. Both
follow. You ruff a heart in your hand,
and go back to dummy with another
trump and ruff a second heart. Now
you use dummy's A as an entry,
ruff the last heart and exit a diamond,
won by your RHO. He continues a
diamond, ruffed in dummy. You are
now in dummy, which holds K 9 5
and the J. You have 8 6 4 and the
Q.
Lead the 5 toward the 8 6 4.
With Q J 2 and the K, RHO must
split the spade honors - and he is
end-played! He must give you a ruffsluff or give up what appeared to be a
natural spade trick.
Well bowled! But would you have
made that play without the auction information? You probably should, but
listening to the auction guides you to
the correct play.
Another example: After a 2 Flannery opener by West (showing five
hearts, four spades and an 11-15
HCP), partner passed, East bid 2
and sitting South, I held:
A 7 3 A J 10 9 6 5 A K 10 4.
I bid a quiet 3. West offered 3,
partner bid 4, and I blasted a eupeptic 6! A high heart was led and
dummy tabled:
K 9 6 5 10 9 6 5 4 K 8 3 9.
I mumbled something about
doubling 3 and ruffed the heart
continuation. It appeared that I had

Zeke Jabbour
jabbour@comcast.net

to ruff two clubs and drop the Q.
So I played the two high clubs. When
I ruffed the third club, West followed
with the Q! That meant that East
had at least three diamonds. If one of
them was the queen, I had a problem
if I ruffed my last club.
I was thinking trump coup when
I realized the contract was cold. I
played the K and all followed low,
so I now knew the entire distribution.
I finessed the diamond, ran all the
trumps, and on the last one (trick 10),
we reached the following position:

 Q 10 8
Q
-
-

K96
 10
-
-
N

W E
S

A7
-
5
 10

J43
-
-
J

I led the 5 and West was forced to
release the spade to preserve the Q,
so I pitched the heart from dummy,
now East was forced to release a
spade to preserve the J, and three
spade tricks fulfilled the contract! A
double squeeze! Sometimes descriptive bidding is too descriptive.
r
January 2010 Bridge Bulletin

59
Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of January 2010
