Vil's Hand of the Week
Board 5 from Wednesday 10th May. Dealer North and N/S vulnerable
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A642
KQT65
A
AQTThere is no need for North to open anything other than 1H. Those of you who for some reason play a 2C or 2D opening to say “19-21” please forget it immediately and play 2C as the ONLY forcing opening bid. The North hand is not good enough to force to game, do you not agree?
Nearly all hands with only 19 HCP should be opened at the one level only. Here, South has only 4 HCP and technically does not have enough to respond, but with FOUR card support for partner's suit AND an outside void, a raise to 2H is totally warranted. That is all North needs to hear to go to game.
The play is not quite as straightforward as the bidding but if declarer looks at the potential losers the answer should come to them. There are three spade losers and two club losers to take care of when the king of spades is led by East. The best way to avoid them is to try and ruff as many of them as you can, in dummy.
Therefore do not draw any trumps and proceed on a 'cross ruff': win the spade ace, cash the club ace discarding dummy's spade, and then start on your cross ruff. East will over ruff the second diamond, but will need to do so with the ace and declarer will still scramble ten tricks somehow. Not an easy play to spot and execute but when you have losers to take care of, what choice is there?
Unfortunately, while there were three pairs in 4H, not one of the declarers made, though those in 1H and 2H did make four. Two Norths were in 3NT, how or why I won't even try to guess. At least they did make their games, though their top results on the score card were somewhat unjustified. 4H making 4 would have been a clear top on the night.
