Few declarers made twelve tricks in a 4H contract on Board 18. Needless to say, there were none in 6H which can be made, if you have the help of Deep Finesse.
Board 18 from Wednesday 17/01/24
Dealer E NS Vul
There were some Wests who generously led the ace of spades, so making twelve tricks was a cake walk after that. But given the more sensible lead of the queen of diamonds, how does Deep Finesse make twelve tricks, and is that a sensible line to take in a normal match point session?
It is always a good idea to preserve the entry to the hand with the tricks, so Deep Finesse wins the ace of diamonds and leads the ten of clubs, West winning and continuing diamonds. Now there is a diamond loser for declarer if three rounds of trumps are drawn, so Deep Finesse takes the two top trumps and ruffs a spade. Then two top clubs follow, dummy discarding two diamonds. A diamond is then ruffed with dummy’s last trump and hand re-entered by ruffing another spade. The final trump, plus two clubs now adds to twelve. Is Deep Finesse’s line a sensible line or not? I definitely think it is, but then we don’t have the inside knowledge that Deep Finesse has!
KQ862
AK6
A432
T