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Zia's
Question and Solution for Week 10
'I
must confess that I have a tendency to be impatient with slow partners.
But years of playing with great players who took their time to find
the right play forced me to accept that there are times when you
need to deliberate. The game is just too tough.
That
doesn't mean this hand is hard - or does it?'
- ZIA
North
deals and NS are vulnerable. Zia is West and has these cards:
The
bidding is as follows:
|
West
|
North
|
East
|
South
|
|
|
1
|
2
|
3
|
|
Pass
|
3
|
Pass
|
3
|
|
Pass
|
4
|
Pass
|
4
|
|
Pass
|
5
|
Pass
|
Pass
|
|
Pass
|
|
|
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At
this vulnerability, East's 2
bid is Zia's partner's weak jump overcall showing a six-card suit
and 5-8 high card points. The final contract is 5.
Zia
leads Q and this is
the dummy:
North
plays 2 on Zia's Q
lead and Zia's partner plays K.
South wins with A. South
leads 8 to dummy's
A. Zia plays 3
and his partner follows with 5.
South plays K from
dummy, East follows with J,
South with 2 and Zia
plays 6. North continues
with 4 and East plays
Q while South plays
3.
What
card would Zia play?
Zia's
Solution
The
full deal is as shown:
Zia's answer is 10,
9,
6
or 3
(each of these cards is considered correct for the Orbis Hand of
the Week). Zia
would discard any heart except K
or Q.
From
the play to the first three tricks, East is marked with KJ10
and QJ. He can't have
another high card and indeed, since South was trying for slam instead
of settling for an easy 3NT, declarer must have AK
and A.
Suppose
Zia overruffs the third round of diamonds. Zia may return K,
but South will win with A,
play a trump to an honour in dummy and lead a master diamond, discarding
a heart from his hand. Zia can ruff, but South will win his return,
cross to dummy's remaining club honour and discard his losing spades
on North's two winning diamonds.
But
if Zia refuses to overruff, South has no way to make the contract.
South might then lead a trump to dummy and continue by playing a
diamond from dummy to discard a loser. But now Zia would ruff and
- the crucial point - Zia would still have an extra trump left to
stop the run of the diamonds once North's second trump honour has
gone.
Notice
that South has played the hand with great skill and safety. Once
East follows to the third diamond, it's correct to ruff low, hoping
to tempt Zia into overruffing from an original holding of 2, 3 or
4 trumps. By this clever play, declarer would cater for most distributions.
Suppose, for example, that Zia had overruffed from an original holding
of 42 doubleton and returned
a heart honour. South would win, cross to a club, and lead a diamond
which East must ruff. South would overruff, return to the remaining
high club in dummy, and cash diamonds. Declarer has tried to cope
with all situations apart from Zia's overruffing with a singleton
trump, which is not possible since Zia would then have nine hearts.
'I
hope you resisted the temptation of the apple!'
Final
Result: NS win 10 tricks for -100
Back
Conceived
and sponsored by Orbis Investment Management Limited. To learn about
the award winning Orbis Funds, visit www.orbis.bm.
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