One of Portugal’s best pairs, and my good friends Manuel Capucho and Maria João Lara, showed me a nice technical hand from yesterday.
Board 9 Dealer N EW vul.
West North East South
M. J. Lara M. Capucho
pass pass pass
1
1
dbl 2
2
pass pass 3
pass pass 3 All pass
After a nice lead directing intervention by North, Maria João found herself on a tricky 3 contract. The defence started with Ace and King of hearts, switching to the 8. (As you may see, if North after cashing the two hearts switches to, say, a diamond, declarer is home playing a club and later ruffing 3 clubs in dummy and 2 hearts in hand.) Declarer won in dummy with the King and led the singleton club. South won and led another trump. The Q followed, won by South when dummy discarded a diamond. Another trump. A diamond to the King and a heart ruff brought no joy (as expected), but after cashing the J discarding a diamond, this was the end position:
The 7 was led, ruffed in dummy, while North was squeezed on the red suits. Nicely played João! Impeccable timing. The effort was worth 91 out of 118 matchpoints.
