TALK ABOUT DESPAIR............ ( another tale of woe from Bigot- Johnson's never ending bridge misadventures )
The other day Bigot played in a league match with his regular partner , only to suffer one bad board after another. Within the space of 6 boards the match was well and truly lost. The defining moment of their walkabout on Planet X occurred when they were defending an absurd 3NT contract, given that the cold-as-ice , rock solid 5C/5D game should have been the preferred option.
Bigot held KJ632 of hearts opposite his partner's AQ84. Five tricks surely to the defence, contract down one ? But no.....
On Bigot's opening lead of the heart 3, partner hopped up with his Ace . The opponent's bidding , along with dummy's void , clearly indicated declarer's no trump call was either based on a 4 card heart suit, or possibly a 3 card suit headed by the queen.
If partner had elected to play the queen at trick 2 followed by another, life for Bigot would have been easy, but instead back came the heart four ! Declarer played low and Bigot took the trick with jack. But what now ?
Did the 4 promise the queen ? Surely not.... for the right play had be the obvious the heart queen , if only to remove all doubt as to its location. In Bigot's mind to volunteer the heart 2 at trick 3 would the act of an insane man , especially if declarer only had the queen left in his hand. Consequently, this pained and troubled man , who was clearly unable to figure out his partner's holding , decided to place his partner with a 5 card heart suit without the queen. Then in a mad rash moment , he took the plunge by cashing the King, fully expecting to swallow up declarer's bare queen. But no.....
His partner meanwhile on seeing the King suddenly realised the risk of the suit being blocked , so cleverly pitched his queen underneath it. Declarer of course was beside herself with joy as her 10 of hearts was established as a winner, with 3NT rolling in plus one.
Bigot was in a complete state of despair as another precious 10 imps was cast to the wind......
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