From                   31st May, 2006, Board 3

                                          Theme                An Extra Chance

                                          Difficulty            * * *

                                          Dlr South            E-W Vul

The opening lead is the Q♦.

If Clubs are 3-2, the slam is an easy make … win the A♦, draw trumps, ruff out the Clubs, and cross to the K♦ to cash the Clubs.  But suppose that Clubs are 4-1.  Can the contract still be made?

SOLUTION

With a 4-1 Club break, you’ll need to ruff Clubs twice, so you’ll need three entries to the board … two entries to get the ruffs, and a third to enjoy the established Clubs … the A♣ and K♦ provide two entries, where’s the third?  There are a couple of possibilities:

Line A:  Win the A♦, cash AK♠ (trumps are 3-2) … leaving one enemy trump still out, play K♣, and cross to the A♣.  If Clubs are 3-2, we can draw that last trump with the J♠, then ruff out the Q♣.  If Clubs are 4-1, we hope that the player who is short in Clubs is also without the last trump.  This line of play uses the J♠ as the third entry to the board.

Line B:  Win the A♦, draw trumps in three rounds, K♣, A♣, ruff a Club … now, if Clubs are 4-1, we must hope that the K♥ is an entry to the board.

Clearly Line B has better odds … there’s a 50% chance that the A♥ is with West … but something less than a 50% chance that the hand with one Club should also be the hand with only two trumps.  This is the full deal:

Well, the A♥ turns out to be off-side.  Did you go down as a result?  No, of course you didn’t, you gave yourself one tiny extra chance … having won A♦, drawn trumps, cashed the high Clubs and ruffed a Club, you took care to play a Heart next (not a Diamond).  Now, when the A♥ was off-side, you abandoned the Clubs and used that last board entry for a Heart finesse … as East started with specifically AJ9 of Hearts, the 3 Heart tricks that you got were enough to bring the total to 12 without the help of the long Clubs.  When it comes to tiny extra chances, this one is about as tiny as it gets, finding East with ♥AJ9 was less than a 1% chance!

Keys to Success

   - After the Clubs fail to break, spotting the miniscule "extra chance" in Hearts

   - As a result, trying to get to Dummy with a Heart first (not with a Diamond), keeping the options

     open