Sheffield Bridge Club	Established 1936

TIME  SLIP

(From Sheffield Bridge Club Newsletter No 60, May 1990)

I was sitting South at the recent Yorkshire Simultaneous Pairs when, on Board 9, I found myself playing in 6ª with the lead of the Ace and another heart:

I took ©Q and cashed ªA and was just about the claim the rest of the tricks when West showed out! Oh dear! I looked at the opposition. It was Mike Pomfrey and Sandy Davies! Oh dear! I could expect nothing but the best defence from these two International players!

Before reading on, plan your own line of play!

I realised that I had somehow to finesse trumps twice. I could do so once immediately, and so, at Trick 4, I led ª6, but, of course, Sandy went up with ª9, so I still needed to finesse again. The only way I could do that was to lead diamonds and when East ruffed, I could over-ruff.

But there was a snag. I could see that East would be reluctant to ruff any diamond for fear of being over-ruffed and the time would come when I would have nothing left in my own hand but trumps, and I would have to ruff a diamond before East, and then I would have to lead trumps away from my own hand. To prevent this from happening, I would have to ruff a winning diamond early and return to dummy with §A to continue the diamonds.

At Trick 5, therefore, I cashed one more top trump and then ¨A followed by ¨J, overtaken in dummy. Then I ruffed a winning diamond.

“Nice plan, shame about the timing!” guffawed the Pig Trader in the bar afterwards after I had failed to make the contract. “In your enthusiasm, you ruffed a winning diamond one trick too early! You should discard your losing club on your third diamond and then ruff your fourth diamond. Then you can re-enter dummy with §A to lead a fifth diamond at Trick 11, and if East still refuses to ruff, you discard ©K. At last, at Trick 12, the lead is in dummy with you holding ©K8 over East’s ©107.”

This play is known as Trump Reduction, or Grand Coup.

Finally, to rub salt into the wound, the Pig Trader added that 6NT played by North would have been far easier!

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