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March 07, 2020 04:00 pm | Updated 04:00 pm IST

Both vulnerable, West deals

North must have had an exciting few seconds waiting to see if two clubs became the final contract. West, who might well have passed, persevered with two hearts and was gob-smacked by what happened next. North jumped to four no trump, showing a huge minor suit hand with longer clubs than diamonds, and South jumped to six diamonds. North carried on to the grand slam and West was looking for a place to hide.

South won the opening heart lead with dummy’s ace and led a diamond to his ace, getting the bad news. South led a club to dummy’s ace and continued with the king of clubs. East did well not to ruff this, discarding the next spade instead. Declarer ruffed a club and returned to dummy with a heart ruff to begin running high clubs. Should East ruff at any point, South would over-ruff, cash the other high trump, and return to dummy with a ruff. East’s exact distribution was known, so South should never ruff the “wrong” major in dummy. The king of diamonds would draw the last trump and dummy would be high. Should East never ruff, the last three tricks would all be high trumps, starting with a trump to South’s 10.

When an overcall is passed back to the opening bidder, opener must keep the bidding open when short in the enemy suit. He can pass, however, with three or more cards in the opponent’s suit. West is busy memorizing that rule right now

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