Be Watchful of Entries



A 8 6
------
K Q 9 5 4
9 7 5 4 3
K 9 7 5 2 Q 4 3
K Q 9 6 2 8 7 4 3
8 10 6 2
J 8 A 10 6
J 10
A J 10 5
A J 7 3 Contract: 6 diamonds
K Q 2 Opening lead: K of hearts

Two people in the same contract with the same opening lead. One went down while the other made it. Declarer misplay in the first case? Defender misplay in the second? Or just a wrong guess, such as on a 2-way finesse for a Q or J. Well, lemme start with the declarer who went down:
Win the first lead, jack of hearts, covered and ruffed, diamond to the ace, and now back to the K. Actually, the other declarer started out the exact same way (well, okay, it was the Q, not the K at trick 4). And here at trick 5, they parted company. The failing declarer took the third round of trump. There were originally 3 in the long hand, weren't there? A club to the K, cash the 10 of hearts, sluffing a spade and . . . and . . . a low club to the J!
This declarer's error is obvious. He was simply wasteful with his entries. If the ace of clubs is offsides, it won't matter a whole lot how you play the suit. But if it's onsides -- and by the principle that you want to play consistent with your bidding, meaning you've got to assume the ace of clubs is onsides --, you're going to need how many entries to dummy? Well, c'mon. We're not talking higher mathematics. You're going to need 2 for two leads toward the club honors, and you're going to need one after unblocking clubs. Further, since the defense can well lead a spade after taking the ace of clubs, you've got to be ready to make a couple of these leads in diamonds! Especially the last one i.e., after unblocking clubs. And how many did this declarer allow himself?
Well, one was wiped out at trick 2, ruffing out the Q of hearts. That was of questionable value to begin with, if you're going to set up clubs. You can only sluff one spade on the third round of the suit, and that's a spade you can ruff in the closed hand anyway. Then three more entries were wiped out on three trump leads! Well, okay, only two are wiped out, since declarer finished in dummy. Since the ace of trump lead (or J) can't be avoided, that means three entries to dummy (the ruff and K Q) have been used to take that first lead toward the K Q of clubs. Three. Wouldn't it have been nice if East hopped up on the first round?
If declarer uses up his last entry to lead again toward his remaining club honor, a spade lead blocks the clubs, and declarer can't make the hand. Actually a heart lead also would have beat the hand on that line, since declarer had cashed his 10 of hearts. So evidently he figured, well, maybe I'll get an ace doubleton in clubs, but it wasn't to be.
The other declarer switched to a club lead at trick 5. Now on the Q holding, he returns to the K of diamonds, drawing the last trump, and another club lead fixes the opposition, since declarer has two remaining entries to dummy. One is the ace of spades, allowing declarer to unblock the clubs, followed by a heart ruff, or vice-versa. Well done. Plan ahead, eh? Actually, it isn't planning you need so much as a simple recognition that entries might be tight. You can see at a glance that's you're going to need entries to dummy, can you not? You can see that you're going to need to lead to the K Q 2 twice if the ace is onsides -- and then another entry is needed after unblocking the club suit. You don't really need to count the number you need so much as to see at a glance that you've gotta use entries sparingly, make every one count.
So you use one entry to lead toward the K Q 2 of clubs and one to lead to the K 2 and the rest just might fall into place.