Dealer East None Vul.

                             ♠        3

                             ♥        K Q 6 4

                             ♦        6 2

                             ♣       A Q 8 7 4 3

          ♠        Q 10 6 4                         ♠        J 7 5

          ♥        9                              ♥        A 8 3 2

          ♦        K Q J 10                         ♦        9 5 4 3

          ♣       J 9 6 5                           ♣       K 10

                             ♠        A K 9 8 2

                             ♥        J 10 7 5

                             ♦        A 8 7

                             ♣       2

The hand this week is for all my students who love to cross ruff but on this occasion its correct to do so.

After the ¨K is led, you count your winners and decide on a plan of campaign.

Your initial tally of winners is 2 Spades and 2 Minor suit aces. You could go after the clubs and establish the suit but you will not have enough entries to get back to table if the trump suit breaks badly and the opposition forces you to use up trumps in dummy prematurely. 

Therefore your best option is to take your 4 winners and make the rest of the tricks from a complete cross ruff.

After winning the first trick play two rounds of Spades dumping the Diamond loser.

Now you have trumps in both hands and a different shortage in each hand so let the cross trumping begin.

Cash the Club Ace and Ruff a Club, ruff a Diamond. Play the Queen of Clubs and if East ruffs with the Ace and attempts to draw trumps he can only draw one trump from your hand and dummy and you will still be left with enough trumps to perform the cross ruff.

You eventually make your original 4 tricks plus 3 ruffs in each hand.

You can also watch the following movie to see how the hand pans out. To view this programme you will need  to download htttp://www.haroldschogger.com/bridgevu.setup

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