Dealer East Both Vul

                                    ♠          7 5 3

                                    ♥          8 4

                                    ♦          A Q 9 6 5

                                    ♣         A K J

            ♠          J 8                               ♠          K Q 10 6 4

            ♥          10 9 7 5 3                               ♥          Q J 6 2

            ♦          10 4                            ♦          K

            ♣         9 7 4 3                                    ♣         8 5 2

                                    ♠          A 9 2

                                    ♥          A K

                                    ♦          J 8 7 3 2

                                    ♣         Q 10 6

Our hand is instructive on two levels this week.

Firstly West leads his ªJack trying to find partner. He reasons that he is not going to defeat the contract with his pile of filth and needs to FIND PARTNER. Neither North nor South tried a introduce a Major so everything points to partner holding Spades so he therefore chose to lead a Spade and he certainly found partner.

Secondly, declarer holds up the first trick and starts to think that West is the danger hand and must be kept off lead. However Declarer has also heard of the Zia tip that if somebody doesn’t cover then he will not have the missing honour. Neither West nor East is aware that South has 5 Diamonds in the closed hand so at trick three he plays the ¨Jack and when West plays low he uses this piece of advice and shoots up with the Ace pinning East's singleton King.

Now declarer easily makes 11 tricks from 1 Spade, 2 Hearts, 5 Diamonds and 3 top clubs.

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

  alternatively watch the film www.haroldschogger.com/movies2.htm

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