Entries, Entries, Entries




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K J 10 8 4 2
6 3
Q J 9 6 2
A 9 8 2 10 5 4
6 5 3
A K 10 8 7 5 Q J 9 2
K 7 A 10 5 4
K Q J 7 6 3
A Q 9 7
4
8 3

East-West have an obvious 5 diamond sac against four hearts, losing two spades and a heart, but a lot of people pushed on to five hearts. The defense can take 3 quick tricks, obviously, and no one can fight against that. But suppose the defense doesn't take those three quick tricks? It starts with two diamonds leads. Can declarer now make 5 hearts?
Quick: how many sluffs do you have on a 5-3 side suit? How many on a 4-3, on a 6-0? The answer is that you have as many sluffs coming as the difference, regardless of who wins the trick, minus the number of times you ruff. So if a 5-3 suit splits 3-2, you have two sluffs coming, regardless of who wins the first three rounds (i.e., assuming an entry to the long cards, of course). If the suit splits 4-1 and you don't control the fourth round, but must ruff, then you have only one sluff coming, though you might choose to sluff twice anyway for whatever reason on that hand, possibly because you're comfortable with that hand with the 4-card holding being on lead and can see that you'll get that trick back by sluffing twice.
So now, can declarer sluff enough clubs from dummy to make the contract? One declarer went down because he simply lacked the courage of his convictions. When the king of spades wasn't covered, he ruffed, and that took care of that. Another had enough courage to risk going down 2 and pushed the king of spades through on the first round of the suit, but went down for a different reason. Here's what happened:
Two diamond leads, the second one ruffed with the 7, 9 of hearts to the 10, deuce to the queen, the king of spades pushed through, then the jack, the 3 was ruffed with the 4 (!), taking the 9 and 10 with it, the 8 of hearts to the ace (!) and the 6 of spades took out the ace, ruffing with the jack, and by now you know what declarer did wrong, no?
Trump had been led 3 times, and 2 spades had been ruffed, meaning declarer had a trump left in each hand, which were the the king in dummy and the queen in the closed hand! Declarer had no entry to the closed hand. But wait. It wouldn't have helped if he'd retained the ace of hearts instead of the queen for an entry, because though the fourth trump lead would lend him access to his good spades, the sluffs woudn't matter when dummy has no more trump! The purpose of the spades is to sluff four clubs (since you must ruff two spades) and then after losing a club, to ruff a club, making.
What should declarer have done? If the defense does start with two diamond leads, the second one ruffed, you'll note that declarer has only three trump left in the hand where he's going to need . . . three re-entries. He's going to ruff twice and will need a third re-entry to cash the developed spades. So if you're going to have the courage to push the king of spades through, you should have enough to trust that the distribution won't be against you. The spade leads sluffing clubs should start at trick three, i.e., as soon as declarer gets the lead. He must use the re-entries to draw trump and not wipe out those entries with premature trump leads. Hence, play the K, Q, J, ruffing out the ace when West chooses to go up. Come back on a trump lead, ruff another spade high (the 8, 9 or 10 must control the fourth round), get back on a trump lead to the 9 and run spades, sluffing clubs. You were also, of course, sluffing two clubs on the K Q J, whichever two weren't covered with the ace. Two sluffs from that sequence, and two long spades means four clubs are sluffed. Dummy has been depleted of five trump (three leads and ruffing two spades), but that sixth trump is all you can use anyway. Now you lose a club and claim a good dummy. Making 5.
It was entries, foremost, that queered this hand, but there was also an apparent failure to note that after sluffing 4 clubs, declarer needed a trump to ruff the second round. It's a powerful trump suit, but even with 10 cards, it's not exactly unlimited -- not quite enough for four rounds of trump and ruffing two spades -- and one club! The trump re-entries to the closed hand should be co-extensive with drawing the defenders' trump.
Several people got one diamond lead and then a shift to one round of clubs (then to a spade in one case, to a heart in another). This allowed declarer an extra entry (since he didn't have to ruff the second round of diamonds before hitting spades). After a spade ruff, he can re-enter the closed hand with a diamond ruff, and now has plenty of entries after ruffing a second spade, get back to the closed hand for running spades, sluffing clubs.