FRIENDLY LEAD
by Aleksander Wagner
Long, long time ago, when almost everybody still played Standart American, Goren or Acol and Roman Club, Neapolitan Club and Monaco were fashionable but suspicious foreign inventions, an opening bid of 2S was strong and natural. The list of artificial conventions was relatively short, didn't resemble a phone book as it does now, beginners using conventions without even trying to grasp their meaning or purpose. We didn't have to rely so much on memory and our limited brains had more grey cells free for thinking. And think we did. Not only in bidding, but in defence and play as well.
The following hand occured in my first Championship finals ever, and I was very proud of it.
1092 S W N E
A765 ---------------------------
QJ97 2S p 3S p
J10 4D p 4H p
4 Q83 4NT p 5S p
J1042 N 83 6S p p p
3 W E K86542
Q976543 S A8
AKJ765
KQ9
A10
K2
3S was positive, 4D and 4H were cue-bids, 4NT general cue-bid, 5S showed no other controls, but I knew that my partner had to have few points more to justify his 3S bid. I still don't know which line of play was the best, but the line I chose turned out to be quite lucky.
West led the diamond 3 hoping to find the Ace in his partner's hand and defeat the contract immediately. I took with the Queen in dummy and played the spade 2 to the Ace, then the Ace of diamonds. I admit I didn't suspect that West had led his singleton, long diamonds to the King seemed much more probable. But when he didn't ruff, I felt safe for the first time - now I knew everything I needed in order to make 12 tricks!
I played the heart 9 to the Ace, and the 10 of spades, followed by the 8 from East and a small from my hand. Then the club Jack from dummy, small from East, and playing the King was quite obvious: West had led his singleton in hope to find the Ace in his partner's hand, so he couldn't have had the only missing Ace!
Thank you, Adrian, for having written about this play in your column. How could I remember it otherwise, after all these years?
