Beautiful Finesse
One beginner to bridge, when introduced to the finesse exclaimed "How beautiful!". Indeed; how economical that ace-queen does the work of ace-king. And it doesn't stop there, the positional play is at the heart of ever more complicated tactics in the play, that it is commonplace shouldn't dent our appreciation. I expect you've seen something like this before:
| ♠ KJ107 | ♠ 864 | ||
| ♥ AK85 | ♥ Q103 | ||
| ♦ A | ♦ KJ86543 | ||
| ♣ Q1094 | ♣ --- |
East passed, South opened one club and West had his first problem: Pass, double, one heart, one no-trump or something else? A worthy candidate for bidding-panel consideration. At the Tollemache final Jonathan Green selected double. The opponents bid clubs and East, David Price, diamonds. When it reached the three level Jonathan figured he would take his chances in three no-trump.
The defence led clubs, low to the ace then low, ten and king. A third round was won by the queen, collecting the knave; after unblocking the diamond ace, what next?
Jonathan's led a heart to the ten. If this held he could afford to lose a diamond (and the spade ace), if it did not he would have to hope that the diamond queen came down. Unable to take a finesse in diamonds, he took one in hearts. South held ♠A953 ♥J72 ♦Q9 ♣AJ72 – the heart finesse lost but there was good news in diamonds.
That was a finesse for a knave (though not really for a trick), how about a finesse for an eight?
| ♠ 85 | |||
| ♥ AQ5 | |||
| ♦ AQ83 | |||
| ♣ J865 | |||
| ♠ AKJ4 | ♠ Q10632 | ||
| ♥ K94 | ♥ 10762 | ||
| ♦ KJ | ♦ 62 | ||
| ♣ AK43 | ♣ 97 | ||
| ♠ 97 | |||
| ♥ J83 | |||
| ♦ 109754 | |||
| ♣ Q102 | |||
From a Winter League match a few years back, West opened two no-trump and became declarer in four spades, receiving a trump lead. The task is avoid south gaining the lead while establishing the heart suit. It may seem tempting to ruff out clubs while drawing trumps and lead a heart to the nine but north can simply exit with ace and another diamond leaving West with two more heart losers.
The successful play is to run the heart seven. It does South no good to cover, the ten-six are now equals against the knave and declarer takes another finesse to create two heart tricks to go with his four trumps in hand, two top clubs and two club ruffs. Quite beautiful don't you agree?
Published Saturday 27.Feb.2010