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ACES ON BRIDGE

Bobby wolff

“Now they know how many holes it takes to fill the Albert Hall.”

— John Lennon

Today’s deal from an international online match sees declarer make effective use of the law of vacant places.

South should show diamond tolerance after North’s fourthsuit forcing call; anything else would be misleading. Since two diamonds already set up a gameforce, North would have supported spades a round earlier with three. Three spades, therefore, showed only a doubleton. South took control after that, optimistically driving all the way to a grand slam once North admitted to holding the diamond king.

Declarer won the club lead in dummy, crossed to the heart ace and ruffed a heart. He lacked the entries to ruff another heart and still get back to hand to draw trumps without stranding the long diamonds, so he continued with the spade jack, the diamond queen and the remaining trumps, discarding all of dummy’s clubs.

After West showed out on the second spade, declarer scorned the percentage play of cashing the diamond suit from the top in favor of finessing the diamond 10 on the second round. Outside the trump suit, West had 12 vacant places to his partner’s eight, meaning West was clearly favored to hold the diamond length.

When East followed low on the diamond 10, declarer had three parking spots for his rounded-suit losers, and the ambitious grand slam came in.

The successful South player, Zach Grossack, had put one over on his world-class opponents, Helgemo and Helness, earning a 14-IMP swing for team Edmonds in the April Invitational Teams.

ANSWER: You can overcall one spade, planning to come again if the auction reverts to you at a low level, or you can double and then bid spades. Your well-placed hearts make the aggressive move of doubling more reasonable, but whenever you have spades, it is best to get them in unambiguously. Who knows what partner might do if he thinks you have diamonds?

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2022-05-28T07:00:00.0000000Z

2022-05-28T07:00:00.0000000Z

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