Spokane Daily Chronicle – 20 Mar 1930
The great mistake the average player makes on defensive play is not trying to visualize what is in his partner’s hand. Good defensive players protects their partner’s hand.
The Bidding. After South, the dealer, bid one no trump and West bid two hearts, North/South end in a 3NT contract.
The play
West opened the six of hearts, the fourth best of his long suit. Dummy played the five, East the 10 and declarer won the trick with the king of hearts. Declarer now leads the ace and king of diamonds, West follows with the six and eight, dummy the three and four, and East the deuce and nine. Declarer now leads the five of diamonds from his own hand and West discards the six of clubs, dummy wins the trick with the queen, picking up the jack in the East hand.
South, the declarer, next leads, the 10 of diamonds from dummy on which East discards the seven of spades, the declarer the deuce of spades and many players with the West hand would now carelessly discard the three of clubs, but West proper discard the four of hearts.
Dummy now leads the seven of diamonds, on which East discards the four of spades, declarer the five of spades, West discarding the three of hearts. South, the declarer, now leads the four of clubs from dummy, East plays the nine of clubs, forcing the declarer to cover it with the king, and West wins the trick with the ace of clubs. West now leads the eight of spades as his partner has asked for a spade lead. Dummy plays the three and East, rather than give the declarer two spade tricks, plays the 10, which the declarer wins with the queen.
Tries for break
Declarer, now hoping to get a spade break which would give him his contract, leads the nine of spades, and here again West must refuse to -surrender his three of clubs and must discard the deuce of hearts. Dummy follows with the six and East wins the trick with the Jack. East now leads the ace of spades upon which the declarer discards the five of clubs, West must now discard the eight of hearts, dummy following with the king.
East now leads the Jack of hearts and the declarer, hoping to force East to lead into the tenace in clubs, refuses to cover, playing the seven of hearts, and if West is careless, he will allow his partner to hold the trick, which would be disastrous as the declarer then would win the remaining tricks.
West must overtake his partner’s heart with the ace of hearts, dummy discarding the eight of clubs. West now makes very valuable use of the three of clubs that he has been holding all this time and leads it.
Of course now all the declarer can do is take his queen of dubs, and he has been held to two no trump.
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