"Too Late!!" she cried

From Wednesday 8th Feb.
I don't like to talk about slams too much but this one is worth discussion. That is because TWO pairs played in 3NT despite what should have been a known spade fit (at LEAST 4-4 no matter what your bidding system is), ONE hapless North in 4C, and one South in 4H! The people in question will know how that happened and I hope will know better next time, though 'next time' is invariably too late.

Board 13 Dealer N ALL Vul

	A9865 A KQJ2 AJ9
Q42 J53 T654 KQ4		T QT642 9873 T72
	KJ73 K987 A 8653

Firstly, let's look at the bidding. North should open ONE SPADE. As I have said in earlier articles, there should be no reason to open a 19 point hand with anything but a ONE level bid. What should South do? The book will tell you that with 10 or 11 HCP and support in partner's suit you should raise to three. But this South hand has great spade support as well as a singleton outside (i.e. 'ruffing values'), so the 11 points becomes worth far more than just a raise to 3S, and South can confidently bid 4S.

North could now bid six, but might like to check to see if South has the missing ace. So, 4NT (Blackwood) and South shows one with 5D. No need to ask for kings, so North bids 6S. The one poor North who ended up in 4C must surely have asked for aces with Gerber after South raised to 3S. There can be NO excuse for South to have passed 4C unless a cow was flying past at the time. And I have absolutely no idea how one South got into 4H, maybe you can tell me if your were either a participant in the auction or an observer!

Now for the play. While your hand record will tell you that 7S can be made, that requires declarer to take an ANTI PERCENTAGE play, so just ignore that. The simple way to play the hand in a spade contract is to win whatever the lead is and take two rounds of top trumps. That leaves the queen with a defender but declarer can then play four diamonds and discard three clubs from dummy and then cross-ruff the rest, allowing West to take his or her top trump whenever they want.

This is fairly normal declarer play technique. Only one North managed to make twelve tricks, so declarer play practice is in order for the others.