Hand of the Week #13

This Hand of the Week was dealt out randomly at this week's Monday night lesson session, and I couldn't have set it up better if I had tried. It's a declarer play problem. Find your best chance to make 4:

	Q 5 Q J 8 7 5 T 8 2 8 6 5
	A 7 4 2 K 9 6 4 2 A Q 7 A

With the opponents silent, South opens 1; North, with no distribution, conservatively makes a simple raise of hearts rather than leaping to game; but South with 5-loser hand is happy to jump to 4. The opening lead is a small spade.

The first card you play is the first key play of the hand. Calling for the Q is your only chance to win two spade tricks. If you play small, East should play the jack or ten from KJxx or KTxx. And if East has neither the J nor the T -- the opening lead would have been the J, not a small spade. But no such luck today. East covers the Q with the king. Now what?

The obvious line of play is to plan to pull trump, ruff two spades in dummy, and take a diamond finesse. You will lose one spade, the A, and either one or two diamonds depending on whether the finesse works. But you can do better -- almost guarantee the contract -- with an endplay. You need to eliminate all the black cards from both hands, keep a trump in each hand, and then put West in the lead, forcing him to either lead a diamond for you or give you a ruff-and-sluff.

You do have to be careful you have enough entries to accomplish this. If you win the first spade and immediately start on pulling trumps, East will win the A and lead a second and third round of spades, and leave you an entry short to be able to ruff all your clubs. Make sure you cash the A to prepare to crossruff the black suits, before you let your opponents back into the lead with the A or the second spade.

The complete deal was set up beautifully for a lesson hand, with the K and K both offside so the "two finesses" line of play fails and the endplay is necessary to make the contract. (And why was West's opening lead a spade and not the Q? I don't know. But it's really what happened, and makes the declarer play problem much more interesting.)

	Q 5 Q J 8 7 5 T 8 2 8 6 5
6 3 T 3 K 9 5 Q J T 9 5 4		K J T 9 8 A J 6 4 3 K 7 2
	A 7 4 2 K 9 6 4 2 A Q 7 A