BRIDGE BITES #11
|
FINESSES ARE EASY
Brian Gunnell |
Of course they are! You just
lead towards the AQ or KJ or some such holding, and, when fate is kind, an extra
trick materializes. But, if they can, experienced players will avoid the whims
of fate, as in this deal.
Both Vulnerablle
South West North East
1♠ Pass 3♠ Pass
4♠ Pass Pass Pass
♠ JT765
♥
652
♦
A7
♣ AT8 |
Dummy
West East
Declarer |
♠ AKQ32
♥
AK4
♦
43
♣ J43 |
West leads the
♥Q,
and when Dummy goes down you see that the two hands have the dreaded mirror
distribution. That’s not good … no ruffs in either hand … no pitching of losers
on side-suit winners. You can see a certain loser in Hearts and another in
Diamonds. So, if 4♠ is to make, then Declarer must avoid losing two Clubs.
There are various ways to finesse in Clubs, care to list them?
►
Here are the most obvious ways to
play Clubs:
-
Finesse the Ten:
That works whenever West has the King and the Queen and also when West
has a doubleton or singleton honor. That all adds up to about a 32% chance of
success.
-
Finesse the
Eight: The hope is
that West has the Nine and at least one of the missing honors. That’s about 31%
but gets better when you consider that West might make the mistake of splitting
his honors on the first round.
-
Run the
♣J:
Here you hope that West has the KQ or that he has one honor and goes wrong by
not covering. Hard to assess a percentage for that one.
So, which finesse do you choose?
►
The correct answer is that you
don’t care for any of these finesses, you much prefer the 100% method!
Draw trumps, cash the red suit winners and exit with a Heart (or a Diamond).
The defenders can take their Heart and Diamond tricks but now their goose is
cooked. If they lead another red card then Declarer pitches a Club loser from
one hand and ruffs in the other hand (the so-called “ruff and sluff”). And if
they break open Clubs then Declarer will lose only one trick in the suit,
however the suit is distributed. Yes, finesses are easy, especially when
you can avoid taking them!
►
|
♠ JT765
♥
652
♦
A7
♣ AT8 |
|
♠ 98
♥
QJT7
♦
KJ6
♣ Q652 |
Dummy
West East
Declarer |
♠ 4
♥
983
♦
QT9852
♣ K97 |
|
♠ AKQ32
♥
AK4
♦
43
♣ J43 |
|
You can see that none of the
aforementioned finessing works on the actual layout, all the more reason to
takes the 100% route to 10 tricks.
Back to Index