I hope Zia Mahmood will forgive me. It’s not often I come across a contract that he has failed to make while his opponent in the other room has succeeded — and I can’t resist writing about it. The occasion was the final of this year’s Vanderbilt Cup, the hugely prestigious American knock-out teams event. What it goes to show is not that Zia took an inferior line (heaven forfend!), but what a difference an opening lead can make. That single card can determine the entire fate of a contract.
Against Zia, West (Marc Jacobus) led the ♦8. If trumps are 2-2, and West has no immediate ruff, there is only a trump and a heart to lose. But that diamond looked very much like a singleton: if Zia touched trumps, East might fly in with the ♣A to give West a ruff.
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