“To spell out the obvious is often to call it in question.” – Eric Hoffer

In today’s deal, whether North should use Stayman on finding his partner with a strong balanced hand is a vexing question.

Sometimes doing so facilitates the defense.

Other times a bad trump break will defeat a major-suit contract when no-trump would have been easier.

Today, whether North uses Stayman or not, the final contract will be in no-trump.

West leads the heart queen, and South wins and must start the diamonds.

The logical defense is for West to capture the diamond queen and clear the hearts from the top.

Now the defense has set up enough winners to beat the game if West gets in again.

So what is South to do?

When he cashes the jack of diamonds and leads a diamond to dummy’s king, he should resist the temptation to take a spade finesse.

That is because if the spade king is with East, the contract is safe, West being the danger hand.

After all, declarer has two hearts, two clubs, and three diamond winners, so he needs only two spade tricks.

Since West’s hand counts out to five hearts, four diamonds and four black cards, a throw-in play is a more attractive option.

Declarer cashes the ace of clubs, takes his fourth diamond followed by the club king, and now exits with his third heart.

West can cash three hearts to get his side’s tricks up to four, but then has to lead away from his spade king into South’s A-Q, conceding the contract.

Bid with the aces

South holds:

Answer: Jump to four spades rather than simply bidding three spades.

Your partner showed a really good hand when he forced you to bid at the three-level.

In context, your extra shape suggests you should bite the bullet and bid game.