From                  24th January, 2007, Board 23

                                          Theme               Exotic Squeezes

                                          Difficulty           * * *

                                          Dlr East            Both Vul               Hands Rotated

                                                                                                 for Convenience

That was quite an imaginative 5♣ bid by Partner, no doubt a tribute to your stellar Declarer play.  West’s opening lead is stellar, too, he starts with the A♣ and then the Q♣ (South pitching a small Heart).  West has sacrificed his second trump trick, but has stopped the ruffs on the board, and has further held your Dummy entries to just one.

You can count 6 Clubs, the A♥, and a successful Diamond finesse will get you up to 9 tricks.  Even if the K♦ is doubleton with East (quite possible on the auction) that will still only be 10 tricks, unless West fails to see the importance of hanging on to all his Diamonds.

Anyway, that’s enough clues, what’s your plan?

SOLUTION

At some point, we’ll cross to the A♥ and take our Diamond finesse, but it can’t be wrong to play off first all of our Clubs but one.  Let’s say that the defenders grimly hold on to all their Diamonds.  Finally, we cross to A♥, take the Diamond finesse which mercifully works, and cash the A♦, felling East’s King.  Now, we cash the last Club, and find that we have stumbled into a Stepping Stone Squeeze!

	♠ T98542 ♥ A ♦ Q652 ♣ T6
♠ AQ6 ♥ K93 ♦ 9743 ♣ AQ5	North    West           East            South	♠ KJ73 ♥ JT7542 ♦ K8 ♣ 2
	♠ ♥ Q86 ♦ AJT ♣ KJ98743

On the last Club, West must come down to 3 cards.  She’ll have ditched her Spades by now and will be down to the King doubleton of Hearts and two small Diamonds.  Whatever he does his goose is cooked!  If he pitches a Diamond, the Diamonds will be good.  If he pitches a Heart we can cash a Diamond, and throw West in with a Heart, using his hand as a “stepping-stone” to Dummy’s last Diamond.

Keys to Success

   - Cashing all the Clubs but one (giving West the chance to discard wrongly) ...

   - ... then using Dummy's entry to take the Diamond finesse ...

   - ... then cashing the last Club to inflict the Stepping Stone Squeeze