Hand of the Week, Vol. 3 No. 8

This week we feature an opening lead problem faced by East at the Friday 02 April club game. Your right-hand opponent deals, and the opponents have a spirited auction:

West	North	East	South
	1NT	Pass	2
Pass	2	Pass	4NT
Pass	6	Pass	Pass
Pass

(South's 2 was a transfer to hearts, and the jump to 4NT was natural, showing a 5-3-3-2 had worth about 16 or 17 points, enough for slam if opener has a maximum 1NT opener.) These are your cards:

J T
T 9 2
J 9 8 6
K J 7 3

Against a 3NT or 4 contract, a small club is reasonable. It's likely to be your side's only establishable suit if partner has the Q or A Against a slam bid on distributional values, an attacking lead is still a good choice. But this is a different situation. You have 6HCP, and your opponents bid a slam based primarily on high cards, not distribution. Your partner only has 1 or 2 HCP. It's a huge gamble to hope partner's one face card is the Q Look for a safe lead that won't finesse you out of one of your own face cards. On this deal, that means a spade or a heart. I prefer the spade: if partner has the Q we can set it up while if he has the Q we might save declarer from a touch choice how to pull the trumps.

Dealer North EW vul	K 8 3 A 6 5 A K 7 3 Q 8 5
9 6 5 4 2 J 4 Q 5 4 T 4 2		J T T 9 2 J 9 8 6 K J 7 3
	A Q 7 K Q 8 7 3 T 2 A 9 6

As it turns out South doesn't quite have his bid (I confess, I was the South who overbid.) If you find a safe spade or heart lead, North has only about a 50-50 chance at his contract. Three spades, five hearts, two diamonds, and a club add up to 11. A diamond ruff doesn't gain a trick, just trades the fifth heart for a third diamond. Most likely you'll play West for the K, take a club finesse, and go down. (If you somehow knew East had the K and four diamonds, you could still make six with an endplay, but at the table you won't know how diamonds break, so the finesse is the better line.)

	K — 7 8
9 6 — — 2		— — J K J
	7 — — A 9

I got lucky; my opponent chose the agressive club lead, and after the first trick went 3-6-T-Q we had our twelve winners in the bag. To add insult to injury, the T that was removed from West's hand at trick one turned out to be a key card. East was now exposed to a squeeze in the minor suits.

Declarer won the Q, pulled trump, cashed the AK and ruffed a diamond, then cashed the three spade winners, ending in his hand. On the last spade, East was forced to throw away either a diamond making declarer's 7 good, or a club setting up dummy's A9 Making seven instead of going down one -- all because of an unfortunate opening lead.

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