Dealer
: West
Vuln : North-South |
HAMMAN'S
TIPS #23
by Bob Hamman
the world's #1 ranked player
|
Archives
of all back
issues of all daily
columns are available
with Bridgetoday.com
membership (which
also includes 12
issues of Bridge
Today Magazine,
100 archive issues
of Bridge Today
Digest Online, and
one Bridge Today
University course).
Click
here for
further details
|
|
Opening
lead: K
This
is a good hand for Thanksgiving Day. Christian
Mari, of
France,
led the king of hearts against my
teammates in a Bermuda
Bowl. He
continued hearts
and defeated the contract by two tricks.
I'm not big
on short-suit leads against notrump, but in this case,
with
four
small clubs and no Stayman bid by North,
I agree with the
lead.
Nevertheless, there was an
element of luck here.
At
my table, my partner opened 1 in third seat,
so I led
a spade. I
guess I was a turkey. Declarer
ducked the first round (not
the right
play), and my
partner had the chance to shift to hearts,
but he
didn't, and I don't blame him. Declarer (probably
the biggest
turkey)
won the next spade lead, cashed
the ace-king of diamonds
and then
claimed.
My
tip is this: Against 3NT, consider leading from
a
strong 3-card
major when you have nothing else
and your long suit is weak.
Happy
Thanksgiving. |