Today’s deal is from a tournament in The Netherlands some years ago that attracted a strong international field. South was Meike Wartel, who was quite young at the time, but today is recognized as one of the world’s top female players.
The auction and the opening lead gave Wartel a good idea about where the missing high cards were located. She won the opening diamond lead with dummy’s ace and ruffed a diamond. She led a heart to the queen, cashed the ace of hearts, and ruffed another diamond. She was trying to remove all of West’s diamonds. Mission accomplished!
She led a low club toward the dummy. She might have gone wrong here by playing West for the jack, but West rose with his ace. He was worried that Wartel would play the queen of clubs and another club to end-play him. West exited with his last club to the 10, jack, and king. Wartell led the nine of clubs and West discarded a spade rather than ruffing. West was doing a good job of running, but he could not hide. Wartel exited with a heart to West’s 10. West cashed the king of hearts but then had to lead a spade from his king and Wartel could claim her contract. Nicely played!