Many of us are perhaps not aware of what constitutes a trump squeeze. For there is no simple definition to define it. But a trump squeeze is a positional one and becomes a squeeze in which declarer's ability to ruff plays an essential role after the squeeze is established. In other words, a simple trump squeeze is the one where one defender is being squeezed in 2 suits and arises when in one threat suit, the victim has to retain an extra guard to his stopper in order to save that stopper from being ruffed out.
Of course the simple ingredients of squeeze must be present at least with 3 out of 4 conditions for trump squeeze to work: that there must be only one loser; an entry to the threat suit; with threat cards in the upper hand of the victim; with busy cards reduced to none or one in trump squeeze.
Let us illustrate by example:
The bidding has been exemplary as under:
West leads KH taken by AH. When the second diamond is played east discards hearts. As south what are your prospects in this grand slam? There is one apparent club loser that you need to take care of. The vital question is how? The bidding provides the vital clue. West has bid 3H announcing 7 carder minimum, which leaves him with 4 black cards having followed to 2 diamonds with east holding perhaps 9 black cards.
A good technician at squeeze works out the probability of suits with possible squeeze play as under:
a) If east has 5 spade and 4 clubs he is ripe for the Vienna Coup by cashing the top clubs, then running the trumps.
b) If east has 4 spades and four clubs, he is dead. Cash one club to see if the black queen drops as a general principle for extra bonus. Then run 4 more trumps, discarding clubs. East's last 6 cards will have to be 4 spades and 2 clubs. If he now discards a club, the ace will kill his queen. If he yields a spade, the suit can be ruffed out with AC as an entry. Alternately at trick 4 and 5 if you cash the KA of spades, followed by 4 trumps, if east discards a spade, cross in clubs, ruff a spade, return in clubs to score last spade. If east unguards clubs, cash the tops and return by a ruff.
The was undoubtedly a criss cross squeeze too with north having an entry in south's suit and vice versa. What needs to be remembered here is that spade ruff must be postponed till after the squeeze has taken place. Ruffing spades earlier will result in failure. Timing is all that makes the trump squeeze work.
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North East
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A642 K3
3 A
10432 AKQJ865
AK65 J43
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North East South West
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1C P 2D 3H
4D P 4H P
4S P 4NT P
5H P 5NT P
6D P 7D P
P P
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