Watch out for and eliminate losers

Ogden Nash said, "A family is a unit composed not only of children but of men, women, an occasional animal and the common cold."

A bridge contract is a unit composed not only of tricks but also bidding, declarer play, defense, winners and losers. In today's deal, South is in four spades. What happens after West leads the spade king?

Note that North might raise one heart to two hearts with only three-card support. If he has a minimum opening with 1-3-5-4 distribution, a rebid of two hearts is preferable to two clubs. So South's jump to four hearts promises at least a five-card suit. With only four hearts, he should make a different rebid, perhaps three no-trump with stoppers in the unbid suits, or in one of the other three suits.

South must first count his losers. Here, he has four: two spades, one heart and one club. Then, if he can do it in a reasonable length of time - five or 10 minutes! - he should also count winners. He can see 11: one spade, four hearts, four diamonds and two clubs. So, declarer can make his contract as long as he does not lose those four tricks first. Since he cannot avoid losing tricks to the rounded-suit aces, he must eliminate a spade loser.

Before leading a trump, South must play a diamond to his queen, overtake the diamond jack with dummy's king, and discard a spade on the diamond ace. Now, with his loser count down to three, he should draw trumps as quickly as possible.

Have you worked out the peculiar theme to this week's deals? All will be revealed tomorrow.