This lesson is about when to finesse a queen. The suit we will look at is when you hold the ace, king and jack but are missing the queen.
Example: You are the declarer in 4♠ and your trump suit is ♠AKJ53 in north and ♠862 in south.
Should you play the ace and king, hoping the queen will fall on the first or second round of the suit or should you play the finesse expecting to take the queen on the third round of the suit?
The important thing is the number of cards you hold in the suit. The correct play when the partnership has eight or fewer cards is to try the finesse.
If your suit has eight cards, you are hoping for a normal three-two break of the opponents’ five cards. The odds are three to two that the queen will be in the hand with the three cards.
In other words, you need to finesse as the queen is less likely to fall if you play the ace and king.
Finesses for queens are usually taken on the second round of the suit. By playing the ace or king on the first round you see if the queen falls as a singleton and if the suit is dividing poorly.
Example: You are the declarer in 4♠ and your trump suit is ♠AKJ53 in north and ♠862 in south. Play ♠A first. Then cross to the south hand in a different suit to lead ♠6. After west plays low, try ♠J. When ♠J wins, play ♠K.
When you win the ace or king on the first round of the suit, be sure to keep a ‘tenace’ for the second round of the suit. This means keeping the jack with a higher honour so that you can finesse on the second round of the suit.
Example: You are the declarer in 4♠ and your trump suit is ♠AJ53 in north and ♠K862 in south. Win ♠K first, keeping ♠A and ♠J for the finesse. On the second round, lead ♠2 from south. After west plays low, try ♠J. When ♠J wins, play ♠A.
If you have no entries to cross to the hand opposite the tenace to play the finesse on the second round, or if there is a singleton in the hand opposite the ace-king-jack, you will need to finesse on the first round.
Example: You are the declarer in 2♠ and your trump suit is ♠AKJ953 in north and ♠2 in south. You will only be able to lead from south once, so you need to finesse on the first round. Lead ♠2 from south. After west plays low, try ♠J.
When do you not finesse the queen? There are two important situations:
When you hold the ace-king in one hand and the jack in the other hand, with no ten in either hand, there is no finesse. It is best to win the ace and king. You hope the queen will fall.
Example: You are the declarer in 4♠ and your trump suit is ♠AK53 in north and ♠J862 in south. Play ♠A and ♠K. Do not lead ♠J. If south has ♠Q, south will cover ♠J and you will not be able to win the third round of the suit.
With nine or more cards in your suit you usually do not finesse. When your opponents have four or fewer cards, the suit is likely to divide two-two so the queen will fall under the ace and king.
There is an expression often quoted to help you remember to finesse for a queen with eight cards in your suit, but to play for the queen to drop when you have nine cards – ‘eight ever, nine never’.
Example: You are the declarer in 4♠ and your trump suit is ♠AKJ93 in north and ♠8762 in south. Play ♠A and ♠K and hope ♠Q falls on the first or second round.
© 2022 John Roberts