I Got By With a Little Help From My Friends (the Defenders)

I was playing with Jenn Friday at the Gallery when I picked up this hand:

543
QT976
94
K64

Jenn dealt and opened 1 diamond. I scraped up a 1 heart reply. Jenn jumped to 2S, I bid 2NT and she raised to 3NT. I got a low diamond lead, and Jenn tabled

AKQ2
8
AJ63
AJ85

I looked at the dummy and had a hopeless feeling. I only had 6 sure tricks without any clear plan to get 3 more. In an ideal world, spades could be 3-3, which would get me one more, and if clubs came in I could possibly get 2 more there. There were also remote chances for extra tricks in the red suits, but I would need real help from the defense.

I started out by playing low from dummy. RHO went up with the Queen, a good sign since if he had the ten and played it, I'd have had no chance. Now RHO played the King of hearts, attacking dummy's weak suit even though I had bid them. This gave me some hope, since I could never do anything with the hearts if I had to play them myself as I had only one entry to my hand (the King of clubs). RHO contined with hearts. LHO won the Jack, and, bless her, cashed the Ace. This was my only chance, since now I had two heart winners and an entry to them. So I now had 8 tricks. However, I had to make 2 discards from dummy. I didn't want to pitch my low spade, since that might be the ninth trick, so I pitched a diamond and a club, leaving dummy with

AKQ2
-
AJ
AJ8

and me with

543
QT
9
K64

I now had 3 possiblities for the ninth trick: the long spade in dummy, the J of diamonds and a third club. LHO played a fourth round of hearts, which squeezed dummy. I could either abandon my spade or diamond threat, or play a club, giving up on playing a club to my King and a finesse of the Jack for the ninth trick. I decided to play a club, keeping alive the possibility of a squeeze along with the spade and diamond chances. RHO had to make 2 discards, and played a low diamond and club. I now tried 3 rounds of spades, to discover that LHO started with 4 and RHO with 2. RHO pitched a diamond on the third spade. Now I played the Ace of clubs and a club to my King. Everyone followed. So now, with 3 tricks to go, there was one spade out on my left, one club out, probably on my right, and 4 diamonds including the King. My 2 hands now were

2
-
AJ
-

-
Q
9
6

Now I played the good heart. LHO had to hold her spade to keep my spade 2 from being good, so threw a diamond. I now knew her last 2 cards were a diamond and a spade. I threw the dummy's spade. Now RHO's body language confirmed that I had him. He had the Queen of clubs left and the Kx of diamonds. He squirmed and finally threw the club, so I scored my 6 of clubs and Ace of diamonds at the end. It really didn't matter who had the King of diamonds, since neither opponent could hold 2 diamonds in the endgame without setting up a trick for me in one of the black suits. So it was a true double squeeze that developed once my friends were kind enough to set up my heart winners while I had an entry to them.

Welcome Friends

Welcome to some new contributors to this blog: Bob Klein, Dave Pankratz and Gary Robinson. Should be fun!

The first annual Frank Bessing memorial team game is scheduled for Sunday, April 13 at 1:00 p.m. at the bridge gallery. Only 12 teams can be accommodated, so sign up soon. There is a beautiful plaque donated by Asher designating Frank honorary captain. Many of you have mentioned Frank's inspiring bridge legacy. Michael Nistler has produced a great audio interview with Frank and has generously handed out many copies. Thanks for all your support!

I particularly liked our long-time friend Claudia's comment that Frank is probably playing bridge with Zoe now in the great bridge world beyond. She was his favorite partner until I came to town 15 years ago. After Frank and I formed a partnership we had a lot of success in team games playing with her. Frank thought Zoe was a fine player and a woman of great integrity and spoke of her fondly through the years. Now we miss them both.

See you at the table!