#2 North South Vulnerable
South West North East
1♦ 1♥ 1♠ Pass
2NT Pass 3NT AP
North
♠ A 10 9 8 4
♥ 6 3
♦ K 6 2
♣ 10 9 3
West East
♠ ♠
♥ Q ♥
♦ ♦
♣ ♣
South (you)
♠ K J
♥ A K 5
♦ A Q 7 3
♣ J 7 5 2
West leads the ♥Q. What is South’s plan?
As South, you have five certain top tricks outside of spades, your best suit, and need four spade tricks to ensure the contract. Win the ♥K, no reason to hold up with two stoppers and only one honor to drive out. Cash the ♠K, overtake the ♠J (key play), and drive out the ♠Q. The ♥K is the entry to the good spades. The most tricks the opponents can take is three clubs and one spade. If you duck a heart, you could lose five tricks.
General Guideline with two honors in the led suit is to win the trick when only needing to loser one side-suit honor. The exception is when declarer must lose two top side-suit honors, then declarer must duck the first trick holding two honors in the led suit.
Visit Webinars.PlayBetterBridge.com for free webinar videos called Play These Hands with Me. World Champion and Master Teacher Donna Compton walks you through her thought process of analyzing the dummy and determining the issue of the hand. She will then talk about how she makes the decision as to which technique to apply. The combination of being a world-class player, along with the ability to share her thoughts with all levels of players makes these webinar videos unique. Married to a multi-time Barry Crane Top 500 Champion and captaining the World’s Top Bridge Team gives Donna access to state-of-the-art bidding, play and defensive agreements. Join Donna today and take your game to the next level!
