Part 3

This deal cost our team a place in the final of the Bonn Nations Cup:

			Q642
			J76
			Q5
			K832
	J109				A753
	KQ53				42
	A82				743
	J65				1094
			K8
			1098
			KJ1096
			AQ7

South	West	North	East
Nilsland	Callaghan	Karrstrand	Burn
1	Pass	1	Pass
1NT	Pass	Pass	Pass

We were playing Sweden in the final round of the qualifying stage, and it appeared that the winners of the match would go through to the knock-out final. This was the last of a series of dull boards, and Brian Callaghan led the J against Mats Nilsland's 1NT. Declarer ran this to the king and knocked out the ace of diamonds. Callaghan played the ten of spades, covered by the queen and ace, and I returned a spade to the nine. Callaghan switched to a heart, which ran to declarer's eight, and Nilsland had nine tricks for a score of -150 to our side. An air of general bafflement supervened, the reason for which became apparent when I mentally reviewed the play, then looked in the pocket normally reserved for the travelling score slip. If you examine the diagram again, you may be able to deduce what I found there. Of course, there was nothing we could do about it except to formulate the third and last BOLS Tip:

When you are defending, analyse the bidding and the early play carefully in order to determine the location of the unseen high cards. In this way, you will often be able to get a count on your own hand.