BRIDGE

One mark of a good player is his ability to guess two-way finesses correctly. You don't have to be the seventh son of a seventh son to possess this attribute -- it is simply a matter of assembling clues, interpreting them and acting accordingly.

Take this deal where West leads the K-A-Q of diamonds, declarer ruffing the third round as East discards a club. The contract is in the bag if South can avoid a trump loser, so all his thoughts are devoted to resolving that issue.

Declarer attacks the problem indirectly. He realises, because West has shown up with six diamonds and East with two, that East probably has more spades than West. But since the trump division is far from certain, South postpones the critical guess in order to assemble some vital additional information.

He starts by cashing the K-A of clubs, then ruffs the jack. When West follows to all three clubs, South can account for nine of West's original 13 cards.

Declarer next leads a heart to the ace and returns a heart to dummy's king. When West follows to both hearts, 11 of his cards become known.

The contract is now assured, whether West has one spade or two. Declarer cashes the ace of spades and finesses the jack on the return. If East has the queen (the actual case), the finesse wins, and South is home. He later loses a heart trick.

If West has the Q-x of spades, the contract is still certain. This is because West, having started with two spades, two hearts, six diamonds and three clubs, will have to return a diamond after winning the spade queen, allowing South to ruff in dummy as he discards his heart loser.

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