West’s 3♠ overcall (showing seven
Spades) points the way to the winning line. Declarer wins the opening lead with
the ♦K,
and now proceeds to remove all of East’s safe exit cards. At Trick 2 he takes
the (mercifully successful) Club finesse, then cashes the
♥K,
back to hand with the ♥A,
and another Club. After Declarer has taken all his minor suit winners, the ♠A
is cashed, at which point East is down to the
♥Q
and two Clubs. Declarer now throws in East with a trump, and East is forced to
return a Club, allowing Declarer a so-called “ruff and sluff”, whereby one hand
pitches a (Spade) loser and the other one takes the ruff. That’s a pretty
end-play for 12 tricks. Here’s the full diagram:
►
|
|
♠ A8
♥
K987
♦
AJT8
♣ AJ8 |
|
|
♠KJT6532
♥
J6
♦
32
♣ K3 |
Dummy
West East
Declarer |
♠ 9
♥
Q53
♦
9764
♣ 97652 |
|
|
♠ Q74
♥
AT42
♦
KQ5
♣ QT4 |
|
Well,
Declarer got lucky on that deal. He needed the
♣K
onside, and he also needed trumps 3-2. But credit where credit is due, he did
well to take advantage of his good fortune.
Strangely enough, if South
declares 6NT, there is a totally different end-play, this time directed against
West. Say that West leads a Diamond as before. Declarer wins, finesses the
Club, returns to hand with another Diamond, and plays off the rest of the Clubs
and Diamonds. By now, West is down to
♥J6
and ♠KJT5. Dummy’s ♥K
is cashed and a Heart is run around to West’s Jack. West must return a Spade
and that gives Declarer the 12th trick. West might try and wriggle
out of the end-play by throwing his
♥J
under the ♥K,
but to no avail as that only serves to set up a Heart finesse against East.
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