A COUP
TO BEAT
ALL 
COUPS
...........
( An amazing
story as told
to Bridge-
meister Gibson
several years 
ago )







A rather gifted young 
player found himself in 
a very awkward and 
uncomfortable slam.
In order to bring home 12 tricks, he needed to execute the infamous that'll-teach-you-to-double trump coup, which involved picking up 3 of East's four trumps without ever having to lead the suit.
East of course soon regretted his "easy" double when he saw partner's opening club lead. Clearly , West had assumed the double was one  which called for the lead of dummy's first bid suit .
From there on , the play was swift and decisive. Declarer made the most of his good fortune by looking to play clubs at every opportunity, pinning his faith on the fact that East probably held all four trumps.
The opening lead went to Jack, Queen and Ace. Back to dummy to dummy's King to lead another high club at trick 3. What could East do ? Ruff with the diamond Ace only to see South pitch away his losing spade ? No.....East was forced to ruff low to prevent the spade discard , but declarer happily over-ruffed. Using the heart Ace as an entry , another club was played , ruffed and over-ruffed. Now with two heart ruffs available , two more clubs could now be lead from dummy. On the sixth round of clubs , East had come down to the singleton Ace of diamonds , which meant that declarer was at last in a position to pitch his spade and claim , losing only one trick to the trump Ace. 
When I told Johnny about this hand , he was quick to point out that East was wrong to pin all the blame on West for allowing this slam to make. Why ?......... Well ,  East should have ducked the Jack of clubs at trick one , giving declarer a chance to go wrong if he allowed the jack to hold. Such a mistake would leave him one dummy entry short to execute this devastating and spectacular trump coup.   

  

A student at the