RANDOM REMINDER

Press, Volume XCIX, Issue 29263, 22 July 1960, Page 21

RANDOM REMINDER

THE TURN OF THE TABLE or A BRIDGE PROBLEM FOR LEARNERS

Sometimes the most hopeless situation can be saved, if declarer keeps his wits about him. Consider the problem South had to solve in his effort to make a slam in no trumps on this extraordinary distribution:

South saw in a moment that he was in danger of losing a trick in spades, at least two in hearts, and one in clubs. But he found his way through with the only possible solution. West, recalling some fragment of information about leading his longest suit, opened with x the two of diamonds, which South took in dummy with the ace. There was a vital finesse at the second trick. The ace of spades was led from dummy and East, after a careful assessment of dummy, and recalling that when North had opened with a spade bid. South had been overcome with a fit of coughing, decided to disguise the length of his own spade suit and discard the jack. South immediately covered it—and the ace—with the queen, so effectively that West, with a whoop of triumph, played the king. Then from dummy, after an awkward silence, the

It was a difficult task for South, for it was the first hand of the evening, and the bidding, if brisk, had been slightly confusing.

two of spades was led and taken in South’s own hand with the 10. Declarer then cashed the three diamond tricks. East, aware he had top spades ' and hearts, and finding the pressure of South’s bold tactics oppressive, discarded his clubs, and the five of spades was thrown from dummy. Four club tricks inevitably followed. East, after a brief inner battle, discarded his spades and two hearts. Finding it difficult to conceal his satisfaction, South made the last club from dummy, and took the next trick with the ace of hearts. He was still faced with the likelihood of losing a heart trick to East’s king. And it was then that West’s embarrassment resolves his own. Mortified at the start with the sterility of his hand, overcome with shame at the loss of the second trick, he had failed to observe that he had been dealt only 12 cards.