“Play up! Play up! And play the game!” - Sir Henry Newbolt

West led the club 10 against three no-trump, and declarer could see that he would have only one further stopper in that suit. So there would not be time to develop spade tricks, since that would lose two tempos. The defense would take at least two spades and three clubs.

The hearts would have to provide three tricks, and the diamonds would need to split 3-2 to yield four tricks. The diamonds were likely to break for him, but what about the hearts?

A 3-3 split occurs little more than one third of the time, but even if the hearts did not split, there was an even chance that East held the ace. Therefore, to maximize his chances, he might have to lead three times toward the heart honors in his hand.

So South won the club lead in dummy with the king and played a heart to his king. Next came the king and queen of diamonds; then, critically, the diamond nine was played to dummy’s ace for another heart lead.

The heart queen held, and now South had his third entry to dummy, overtaking his precious diamond three with dummy’s five for a third heart play. This time East rose with the ace, but the club ace was left as the entry to the heart jack: contract made.

Note the need to win trick one in dummy, or declarer never scores his long heart.

Bid with the aces

South holds:

Answer: Your partner’s sequence shows a reverse (four hearts, five or more diamonds, and 16-plus high-card points). You have a decent hand, with both black suits well guarded and a useful builder-card in diamonds. So jump to the contract you hope to make, three no-trump, rather than bid the clubs, or risk stopping in a part-score.