Playing Contract Bridge in 4 Hearts: “100 honors” missing Queen

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In today’s poll, the good news is we have all the winners in the minors. On the other hand, figuring out how to play the major suits seems to require a bit of guess work, or not. Hopefully we can come up with a sound strategy that will help us find that magical 10th trick. In fact, after enough Contract Bridge or Duplicate Bridge play, some hand patterns begin to look like old friends of ours. So put on your thinking cap, explore the alternatives in our poll and elect your candidate – good luck getting your winner on top of the heap!

View our online video commentary of bidding and play with card animation.

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After 2NT by South, North bids 3 Clubs, Stayman asking opener to bid a 4 card major – up the line.  East doubles 3 Clubs – now what’s that all about? Not deterred, South rebids 3 Hearts and responder signfos off in a 4 Heart game.

On lead, West understands East’s double of North’s artificial 3 Club conventional bid as both showing a real suit and asking partner to lead the artificial suit.  With an otherwise difficult lead decision, West is more than happy to lead a Club.

After the dummy comes down, initially our declarer South is happy to count 20 + 8 High Card Points, more than enough for most game contracts.  But on later reflection, South detects a problem – do you see it, too?

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