What do you Do?

	A 9 8 5
	K J 10 9 8
	Q 8 7 2
	------
	6 2
	Q 5	Vul: Both
	A J 9 5 3	Opening lead: Q of spades
	A K Q 3	Contract: ?

How would you handle this hand in diamonds with a spade opening lead? In what contract? Oh, I did neglect to mention that, did I? But then, that's the point of the question. If you're in six diamonds, as some were, then you hafta take the diamond hook. If it's off, then you're down two, but an extra 100 points in penalty is a mere pittance compared to what you're going for, which is close to 1400 points, which is to say that in the long run, you're going to be far better off chancing a 50% possibility for your contract when you're gambling 100 against 1370 than in playing for down one, which is a loser's game.

And if you're only in 5 diamonds? Then, with only one certain entry to those lovely clubs, you want to decline the finesse, sluff three spades in dummy on the top clubs, return to drawing trump, subsequently giving up a trick to the ace of hearts as well as the K of diamonds. Taking the finesse in that case would in essence be to risk a 600-point game for a mere 20-point overtrick, a reversal of the disparity in taking the finesse vs. not taking it.

Here is the whole hand:

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

Well, suppose the third round of clubs is ruffed, inhibiting declarer's ability to avoid a spade loser, and the finesse was on all the time. Yep, yep, yep. We're not talking about certainty here. The club suit indeed is splitting 6-3, just a shade off a 7-2 split, but then it didn't split 7-2 and the finesse was off, and you've just gotta go with likelihood here.

There's another reason why you'd want to look askance at an overtrick, though I grant that it's not always easy to go through all this reasoning at the time of play. But if the finesse is on, those in no trump will probably be finding an overtrick themselves, rendering that 20-point overtrick in diamonds meaningless.

It was rather interesting to note how the defenders handled the spade suit in no trump. A low spade beats three no, whatever declarer does, presuming first-rate defense from there on. East plays the king of spades, regardless of what declarer does (continuing the suit if declarer goes low, of course). He subsequently must hold up one round on the hearts, then winning and shooting a diamond through. Declarer can't make the contract without a successful diamond hook. But an awful lot of Wests (understandably) led the queen of spades, and now declarer has a chance.

One declarer went up with the ace immediately, which isn't too bad an idea in retrospect. Declarer can reason that East surely has the king, and if the suit is splitting 4-3, he has a chance of being able to survive that (if the diamond hook is on, and would probably lose three tricks in the suit anyway if it's off) and if the suit is splitting 5-2 and East has a doubleton king, the suit is either blocked if East retains the king or two honors are spent and dummy has protection against a run of more than two spades. At that point, when one East retained the king, declarer would have had his contract if he'd just knocked out the honor in the dangerous hand -- the long-spade hand --first, i.e., finessing into West's K of diamonds.

If the finesse is off and West has the ace of hearts, it doesn't matter what he does. If the finesse is on, it doesn't matter what suit declarer attacks first first. But if the finesse is off and East has the ace of hearts, then it matters a lot, and that's where declarer met his Waterloo, knocking out the A of hearts first. East held up one round of hearts, took the second, cashed his king of spades, and now declarer can't survive without the diamond hook, indeed, can't even take the diamond hook unless East leads the suit. Had East unblocked the K of spades, declarer still would have made his contract, losing only two spades, a diamond and heart. With East's failure to unblock, declarer had an overtrick coming.

Another declarer ducked the queen of spades and ducked a continuation, so he was in pretty good shape with the A 9 tenace over West's last honor. He can now afford to lose a trick to the king of diamonds and another to the ace of hearts and claim, which he did.