3rd/5th lead and… Brains (or how I met
Ana)
Bernard Marcoux, Sainte-Adèle
I have this lady friend with whom we often
discuss bridge and, to certain questions from her, I answer
sometimes : Brains.
One day, she asked me : What is this
convention, Brains?
On BBO, playing with and against strangers,
you have :
Q982
AQ103
63
A73
RHO You LHO
Part.
1NT p
p p
You are on lead and, really lacking
imagination, you lead spade. Which one ? I usually lead 3/5
(lead the 8) but, playing with a stranger, I led 4th
best, the 2.
Dummy
754
962
K92
Q842
You
Q982
AQ103
63
A73
Declarer calls small from dummy, partner
plays the K and declarer follows with the 10.
Your partner
then continues with the A on which declarer plays the J.
What do you play?
Look at your hand. Which suit would you like
your partner to play now ? Hearts,
obviously. How can you tell him ?
You could say Partner, please play heart, but opponents
would not like that. Look at your cards again, those already
played and those left. Your partner has played AK and declarer
J10. How many spades had declarer? Only 2, obviously.
What spades do you have left?
When your
partner cashes the A, 2nd trick, you have
left
Q 9 8, all winners, but you don’t want to cash them now.
Saint-Augustine, it seems, used to pray like this : God, please
give me purity, but not now. I have aligned all my life along
Saint-Augustine (J).
At bridge also, Saint Augustine applies.
Take a good look. If you drop the
Queen under partner’s ace, that play should wake him up. You
certainly didn’t lead the
from
Q 2. You are not that
smart. When partner sees the spade Queen drop under his King,
he has to stop and ask himself: what is my partner doing ?
This
Queen, sacrificing herself (I hope feminists won’t protest), is
certainly sending a message. Looking at dummy, with those 3
little hearts, partner has to understand you want a heart
switch.
After a few seconds, he duly plays a heart. Declarer
plays small and you win the 10. You immediately see the
problem:
9 8 block the suit, you can’t go back to partner’s hand
for another heart play. Look at the hands after the first 3
cards.
Dummy
7
96
K92
Q842
You
Part.
98 63
AQ3 J7
63 J84
A73 1096
Declarer
K8
AQ1075
KJ5
After your spade queen play, your partner,
knowing your
9 8 are blocking the suit (I hear you
groaning How can I know that?), in hand for the last time, has
to assume you have
A Q10x.
So he has to play the J first in order to make 4 heart tricks.
Now let’s see what happens with 3/5 leads.
You lead the spade 8. After the first 2 tricks, here are the
hands:
Dummy
7
96
K92
Q842
You
Part.
92 63
AQ103 J7x
63 J84
A73 1096
Declarer
K8x
AQ1075
KJ5
Your partner can now play small heart towards
your 10. You will be able to play the 9, then the 2
towards partner’s 6. Partner will come back his second heart :
defence will make 9 tricks with leads 3/5 and…
Brains.
Good methods will never replace thinking. On
BBO, after my spade Queen, my expert (!) partner came back…
spade.
Declarer was the only one to congratulate me for the
spade Queen. Declarer saw right away the spade Queen meant that
the heart King was dead.
I thanked her by saying that she, at least,
had seen the play. Declarer was Ana Roth. And that is why you
can now read my articles on the Argentinian Bridge Site.
Thank you again, Ana and Fernando.
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