Thirty years on

In the Knight Cup we started off on the wrong foot when we arrived late due to a flooded road and then started with a 20% first round. In spite of two zeros from doubling the opponents in cold contracts, we had recovered to about 55% at half time, but Krzysztof and Mark were leading on 66% so it seemed as if we had little chance of winning.

Not so - in the second half we managed over 67% while Krzysztof and Mark were only just over average, so we won by about a top. I won this competition three times in the mid-1980s but had not come close in almost thirty years since.

We certainly had more than our fair share of good fortune; the opponents allowed us to make four impossible game contracts and donated several other good boards, and we gained an undeserved top after a bidding mix-up. This was one of the lucky boards.

A couple of optimistic views in the bidding landed us in a hopeless contract. West led the king of hearts which I won in dummy. I could establish an extra spade for an eighth trick but there seemed no legitimate chance for a ninth so I tried the old Zia ploy of playing on the defenders' best suit.

A low club to the nine lost to West's ten, and he obliged by playing two rounds of hearts. The contract is now cold - if East plays a club I can arrange a strip-squeeze on West in the black suits, and on any other return I can set up dummy's nine of spades.

It wasn't all jam. Here are a couple of hands of half-decent bridge that we managed in between unwrapping the presents. First, a neat hand where a defender was endplayed twice.

West found the best lead of a club, which was covered by the jack, king and ace. I played the ace of hearts and ruffed a heart, crossed to the ace of trumps and ruffed my last heart. Now I cashed the queen of clubs and exited with a trump. This guaranteed the contract on any lie of the minor suits, but there was an added bonus when West had a doubleton club and the king of diamonds. After winning the king of trumps, West led a low diamond which ran to my queen. Now ace and another diamond endplayed West again to give a ruff and discard for the overtrick.

This was an excellent slam that only one other pair managed to bid.

The defence kicked off with the ace of hearts and a heart to the jack. The best line is to draw trumps, starting with the ace, as you can pick up J10xx with East. When trumps are 3-1 you draw three rounds, unblock the queen of clubs, cross to the ace of spades and cash the top clubs. You now know if you can ruff a club to establish a twelfth trick, but if the clubs are unkind you can try for a 3-3 spade break while you still have a trump in dummy as an entry. I didn't get the timing quite right, but fortunately it didn't matter as with clubs breaking the hand was idiot-proof.