If you look at all four hands you would come to the conclusion that the auction shown was very reasonable, even though the final contract may not be. The hand was played during an online duplicate session. The opening lead was the seven of hearts. East won the king and continued with the ace. West played the two. Thinking that his partner started with only two hearts, East continued with a third heart. South played the queen and was surprised to see West follow with the eight.
Having lost two tricks, declarer had his work cut out for him. But the point is that even though the prospects may have appeared bleak, the best advice that any bridge player can ever take to heart is "Never give up!" When you find yourself in a situation like this, ask yourself if there is a distribution that could allow you to make your contract and if you can think of one, play for that distribution.
With this in mind, declarer cashed the ace of spades and was happy to see East play the king. A club to the queen held and the ace of clubs provided a diamond discard. A club was trumped in the closed hand and a small spade went to East's queen.
Had East been paying attention he would have led a heart at this point giving his partner a "trump promotion", but he fell from grace when he returned a diamond. Declarer trumped, cashed the jack of spades and claimed.
The hand was played 16 times and four spades became the final contract 12 times. The contract was made twice and defeated the other ten times. Yes, there was luck involved, but declarer's job is to do the best he can and take whatever good fortune may come his way. When your prospects look bleak, accept the situation as a challenge and work twice as hard to do your best. This is good advice for bridge and even better advice for life.
The Spring North American Bridge Championships were held in Pittsburgh, PA from March 10 - 20. Congratulations to all of the area players who enjoyed success at this tournament. Other results appeared previously. More will be listed in future columns.
March 15. Lesley Green of Lakewood and Marny Schulz of Richfield were 3rd in the evening 299er pairs. Jeffery Myers of Willowick and his partner were 2nd in Stratum B of the stratified pairs. Robert Werner of Chagrin Falls and his partner were 1st and Betty and Richard Haas of Stow were 2nd in Stratum C of the senior stratified pairs.
March 16. Laurie Kranyak of Bay Village and John Kranyak of New York City were 1st in the Rockwell mixed pairs. Don and Kathleen Sulgrove of Twinsburg were 25th and Lloyd Loux of Westlake with Marjorie Baldwin of Akron were 41st in the same event. Pat Spooner of Brunswick and John Spooner of Strongsville were tied for 2nd in Stratum A of the evening side game. Robert Werner of Chagrin Falls and his partner were 4th in Stratum B of the senior stratified pairs. John Viola of North Ridgeville and his partner 4th in Stratum C of the morning side game.
The duplicate bridge game restricted to players with less
than 300 master points, that is currently held at 12:30 p.m. on
Tuesdays at Congregation Bethaynu, 27900 Gates Mills Blvd.,
Pepper Pike is being permanently rescheduled. The game will now
be held on Mondays at noon. For reservations, partners or other
information, call (216)464-3553.
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Bernstein is
a free-lance writer in Solon.
To reach Harvey Bernstein:
hjb19@adelphia.net