Hand of the week commencing Sunday 26th November 2006
§J
is led
plan your play.
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ª |
Q 8 5
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Dealer
South |
© |
A
K 6 3 |
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Love
All |
¨ |
8
7 5 2 |
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§ |
K
6 |
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N |
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ª |
K
7 4 2
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ª |
9
6 3 |
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© |
8 |
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W
E |
© |
9
5 4 |
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¨ |
Q
10 4 |
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¨ |
J
6 |
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§ |
J
10 9 7 4 |
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§ |
Q
8 5 3 2 |
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S |
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ª |
A
J 10 |
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© |
Q
J 10 7 2 |
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¨ |
A
K 9 3 |
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§ |
A
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W |
N |
E |
S |
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1© |
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NO |
3NT |
NO |
4NT |
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NO |
5© |
NO |
6© |
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NO |
NO |
NO |
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This
hand comes from a delightful new book, Inspired Card Play by David Bird and
Martin Hoffman (in the Master Point series for Intermediates). The hand is about
elimination first rather than taking an immediate finesse. After winning the
first trick. Draw trumps in three rounds ending in dummy. Now play the winning
Club King. Play Diamonds and hope that West
gets the lead. He will be endplayed. (If not the Spade finesse could still be
taken later if need be.) As the cards lie West wins the Diamond Queen and
has to either lead away from his Spade King giving you the 12th trick
or if he plays clubs he will be giving
away a ruff and discard allowing you to ditch dummy’s remaining Spade loser.
The
book is full of Top Tips and the boxed tip for this particular hand states “In
an elimination situation, with trumps left in both hands, look for a suit such
as AKX opposite 10XX or AKXX
opposite XXXX. When you cash the Ace and King and exit in the suit, it
may be that only one defender can win the lead. He may then have to lead into a
tenace elsewhere, or give a ruff and discard.”