Watch them Spades


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

The contract is six diamonds, and we see that declarer can make his contract by dropping the stiff king on his left with a 10-card holding, as indeed, some did. Against good defense, there are only 11 tricks outside of whether the stiff king is dropped or not. There's no squeeze, though there would have been one had the defensive hands been reversed, which I'll get to later. But two declarers who dropped the stiff king made an overtrick and of the four others who made the contract, only one did it by dropping the stiff king. So five of the six in the above contract got a gift from the defense, in every case in the spade suit. The overtrick didn't cost the defense much, even in this matchpoint event, but the three who allowed the contract to make after declarer finessed into the stiff king gave up a ver-r-r-y costly trick.
The cases are all different. Here are the five ways the defense gave up that trick. .
One accommodating defender led the jack of spades, which declarer wisely or luckily won in dummy. Now when he finessed into the king, West continued with a spade into declarer's Q 9, finessing his partner out of the 10. A second defender led the jack of spades also, only now a wily declarer himself, winning in dummy, finessed the 9 of spades on second round and thus picked up four spade winners. It's true that declarer did half the work for that extra trick, but there's no way of picking up the whole suit without the original lead of the jack of spades.
A third defender, the East player, simply discarded a spade at his first opportunity to discard anything. I have spoken of this penchant many times before, i.e., getting rid of a valuable guard not when the going gets tough and a difficult decision must be made, but at their first opportunity to discard! Here, with a four-card spade suit showing in dummy and with K 7 4 of hearts in his own hand, when declarer led dummy's fourth diamond with no apparent interest in using it to ruff another heart, this defender held onto those three hearts and got down to one less spade than dummy held.
The next defender discarded his fourth spade, but at least it was when push came to shove. The hand then looked like this:
A K 5 4
------
------
Q
------ 10 8 7 2
10 9 ------
------ -----
J 10 9 K
Q 9 6
------
3
5

It's certainly true that East's partner hadn't been much help, discarding both his spades. Still, declarer would have to take a first-round finesse of the 9 of spades to pick up the suit, for in cashing the ace first and discovering East's holding, the suit would be blocked and declarer could not realize 4 spade winners. You will note that had the E-W hands been reversed, declarer would have a squeeze here on the lead of the last diamond. West would have to commit himself before dummy and declarer would have the rest of the tricks. But the E-W hands aren't reversed, and East isn't squeezed because he's playing after dummy -- and must discard the same suit that dummy does. No cigar.
Could East know this? I'm going to have to say yes. Well, of course he can't know who has the jack of clubs (i.e. if declarer sluffs the Q from dummy, would East establish the J in declarer's hand by pitching the K?) He might surmise that declarer would've taken a simple finesse earlier if he held A J low -- though, to be sure, declarers have been known to shy away from simple finesses -- and further might recognize that he's squeezed if declarer does hold that card, in which case there's no shame, no giving up a trick that he shouldn't have. But he must keep the same number of spades as dummy and hope his partner has the jack of clubs. He must guard the suit only he can guard. So, yes, the king of clubs must go when declarer discards the Q.
And lastly is what should have been an easy one for West, but evidently wasn't, and anyway, is the most interesting situation of the lot. This is the only hand (under discussion) played from the North hand above. Opening lead was the 3 of hearts. Declarer went up with the A, then ruffed a heart to get to the closed hand, and understandably now finessed into the stiff king of diamonds. The return was the three of spades, third hand's ten drawing the queen. Now at this point, declarer could have taken a round of spades with the ace, dropping the jack, a trump to dummy (remember, it's South on the above layout), cashed the 9 of spades, now a trump to the closed hand (North) to cash the king of spades sluffing a club. But declarer doesn't know this, of course. Whether he should have chanced it I'll leave to your judgment.
Anyway, declarer now ran his six diamonds, the hand looking like this (rotated to show dummy in North that everyone was seeing) before the last diamond was played:
9 6
------
3
A 5
8 7 2 J
------ ------
----- ------
K 7 J 10 3 2
A K 5
------
------
Q 8

And it's too late for declarer, or at least it should have been. The spade suit is blocked if East will just keep his jack. If declarer picks up the jack on a low lead to the A, he'd have the 9 of spades in one hand and the guarded K in the other, but with no way to cash them separately.
But this soi-disant advanced player threw the jack of spades on the last diamond! (Declarer sluffed a club.) Should he have known this was a valuable card? Well, I'm not going to say it should have been easy to work out how valuable the jack might be, but I am going to say, "Why on earth hang onto all those clubs when dummy is showing only two and the suit certainly won't go into the fourth round!"
Get rid of your totally useless cards and you just might find you've saved a useful one. And yes, with the spade suit still in contention and surely no chance of running the fourth round of clubs, he should have been able to see that the 2 of clubs can't possibly be as useful as the jack of spades might be. (East had "signalled" -- I guess that's the word -- with the 9 of clubs on the preceding trick.) Take care of your honors and they will take care of you.
Anyway, declarer, after sluffing a club on the diamond lead, could now cash the 9 and then the top spades. How expensive do you think that discard of the jack of spades was? Well, declarer got 94.62% for making and those down one got 7.69%. That's expensive.