Had West started by opening one club rather than a Precision diamond, his opponents probably would have been unable to locate clubs. They would have played three no-trump and would surely have gone down.

As it was, South could bid a natural and forcing two clubs over North’s one-spade overcall. When he caught a raise, he gambled on five clubs, since his clubs seemed too slow to set up in three no-trump.

Declarer won West’s lead of the heart queen in hand and saw drawings trump could wait; he instead had to work on shedding his second diamond loser on a spade. He cashed the spade king and ruffed a heart to dummy. The spade ace and a spade ruff followed.

If declarer had then crossed to the club ace before ruffing both hearts, he would have risked conceding an unwelcome over-ruff on the fourth spade. West would then have been able to draw dummy’s last trump, leaving declarer an entry (and thus a trick) short.

Instead, South ruffed the heart king back to table, and when he took his second spade ruff, it did not matter which defender had the long spades. It was East who had the 13th spade, so West was in a position to over-ruff on the fourth round of clubs and attack diamonds, but declarer remained in control. South was able to reach dummy with the club ace and pitch his last diamond on the spade nine, losing just two trump tricks in total.

This was another deal from a local teams game in which different approaches by the two declarers yielded a swing. Against four hearts, the lead was the same at both tables: the diamond 10.

At the first table, declarer flew up with the ace while East played an encouraging six. Declarer then crossed to hand with a top trump. After returning to dummy with the club 10, South finessed the heart jack. West won, and since his side needed at least one diamond trick, he continued with the diamond three to try to give count in the suit. East won and carefully shifted to the spade king, then cashed another spade to defeat the contract.

At the second table, declarer also won the first trick. Then he cashed the heart tops before playing on clubs. When the third round of clubs was not ruffed, he was able to discard his remaining diamond on a good club. West ruffed in with the trump queen and exited with a diamond, but a spade ruff in dummy was the tenth trick.

What are the odds for each approach? Both plans would succeed if the heart queen appeared singleton or doubleton from East. Otherwise, the first approach makes the contract on just half of the 3-2 breaks, about a third of the time. The second declarer succeeds when there is a doubleton trump queen on his left, but also when the hand with three trumps has at least three clubs. This has just short of a 5050 chance of bringing the contract home, making it the plan to choose.

Both tables in a local teams game reached four spades on the opening lead of the heart jack. Both Souths saw that if trumps were 2-2, 10 tricks would be easy; if they were 4-0, impossible. Each declarer won the lead in dummy and, to protect against a 3-1 break, crossed to hand with the trump ace to lead a low diamond toward the queen.

Both Wests rose with the diamond king and then played the trump queen. One declarer won his king and led a low diamond to dummy’s queen. He continued with the club ace and another club. East won with the jack and exited with a low heart, West’s 10 forcing dummy’s king. When declarer tried to return to hand with a club ruff, West over-ruffed and cashed a heart for the setting trick.

At the other table, when East discarded on the trump queen, declarer saw the danger of taking the king. It would leave him with no fast entry back to hand after unblocking the diamond queen. So he let the spade queen hold. If West continued with the spade jack, declarer could win, cash the diamond queen and eventually return to hand with a club ruff to discard a heart on the diamond ace.

When West instead shifted back to the heart 10, declarer won his king, cashed the diamond queen and came to hand with a trump. Now he could discard a heart on the diamond ace and ruff a heart. Declarer had 10 tricks — four trumps, two hearts, a heart ruff, two diamonds and the club ace.

Suit preference can come on opening lead, but not often. Take the following problem, and assume you hold the East hand.

Consider the auction and ask yourself whether you should pass at your final turn. I agree that this is the normal action, but since you expect you can take a club ruff, put partner in with an ace, then take a second ruff, you might choose to gamble and make a Lightner double.

On the lead of the club five, you ruff away dummy’s ace as declarer produces the seven. Now you must ask: Did partner start with the 5-3-2 in clubs, or is the five his smallest in that suit? If you guess incorrectly which red ace partner holds and partner has no trump trick, declarer may get to discard his red-suit loser on the clubs after drawing trumps.

When Bob Hamman was on lead as West here, he saw that the opening lead of the club queen would be a far clearer suit-preference signal than a wishy-washy five. While leading an unsupported queen might seem dangerous, once you have decided to lead a club, you are never going to score a later trick in the suit no matter which one you choose, so you might as well help partner as much as you can.

After East’s heart return, you will succeed in putting partner in to secure a second ruff and collect 300. But playing back a diamond would allow declarer to win his ace. He might then guess to cash the spade ace and throw his hearts on dummy’s minor-suit winners — and actually make his contract!

The more unreadable the signal partner receives, the quieter the suit-preference message you should be sending. That is the simple face of suit preference; alas, life is rarely so straightforward. Consider today’s deal.

Defending against three hearts as West, you elect to lead a top spade, since you do not care to guess which minor suit to broach. That works out well enough. Dummy plays low, and partner takes the spade ace as declarer produces the five. Then he follows with the spade king as South contributes the two, followed by the spade four for you to ruff, as declarer plays the seven. What now?

The defense to beat the contract is for you to lead a diamond to partner, who can play a fourth spade and promote your heart jack. But how do you know which minor you should lead? Don’t clubs look just as attractive as diamonds, and didn’t partner play his low spade for you to ruff? No! The spade four was suit preference for diamonds — from time to time, the gods of bridge require you to do your bit: in this case, to remember that the spade three had not put in an appearance.

However, that was not the big clue. Partner hit you over the head at tricks one and two when he won the spade ace, then king in unnatural order as suit preference for diamonds (the normal play being king, then ace). Sometimes, one has to improvise suit preference, and a thoughtful partner would foresee the problems in making a small card look big.

As Thomas Gray remarked, “Full many a flower is born to blush unseen.” Today’s deal might have slipped through the cracks if Steve and Betty Bloom’s teammate had not been able to rectify that particular error by providing the Daily Bulletin with details of their prowess at a Gold Coast Congress almost a decade ago.

When Betty led the club 10 against four spades, declarer Sartaj Hans knew that he was in the wrong spot, caused by North failing to bid spades at his first turn. Worse, he could divine that there would be spade ruffs in the offing, not to mention the prospect of a diamond shift from East.

He put up dummy’s club jack and took Steve’s queen in hand, then drew trumps and played on spades. East had had two chances to send a signal. First, he followed up the line in trump (suit preference for the lower suit, here clubs), then he pitched a discouraging diamond nine on the first spade, followed by the diamond two for further suit preference.

Betty got the message. When she took her spade ace on the third round, she underled her clubs, advancing her smallest. Steve overtook her seven with his eight to make the killing diamond shift, and that produced the desired result of one down.

This was an absolute top for East-West; at all the rest of the tables in the main final, 10 tricks were taken in spades or hearts by North-South. (Interestingly, that was the case even when North was declarer, so that a diamond lead would have beaten four spades).

One of the aspects of the game that defeats beginners and intermediates is the concept that every card should mean something. Take this deal from the second semifinal session of a recent Kaplan Blue Ribbon Pairs.

North-South were playing Precision; hence, they perpetrated this inelegant sequence. Using fourth-highest leads, West started with the club four to the jack, queen and six. The club two return went to the nine and 10, and West played back the club three to East’s king. When West let the club-eight continuation hold the trick, East had to decide how to proceed. Dummy had pitched a heart and two diamonds on the clubs. Declarer had thrown a heart.

Should East play a spade, in case declarer started with five solid diamonds and the spade ace, or a diamond, in case he had the hand shown?

There are several clues in these sorts of positions, which spring from a player’s choice when he could play one of two or more equal cards. Here, West had decided to win the club 10, not the ace, at trick two. (This may not be obvious, but remember: West knows East has the king from the play to trick one.) He had then returned the club three, not the ace or five.

In summary, West has played the lowest of equal cards at each turn — so he must want a diamond shift (the lower of spades and diamonds). At the table, East was not up to drawing this inference: When he played a spade, declarer could scramble seven tricks.

In the round robin match between Denmark and Italy at the 1999 World Junior Teams in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, a textbook hand in suit-preference signaling came along. Unusually, it was the hand on lead making the suit-preference signal rather than the hand following suit.

Morten Madsen of Denmark as East thought long and hard before pushing his opponents with his call of two spades — and rightly so. The defense had seven tricks against that contract, but when North doubled a second time just to show cards, South decided against trying to take the penalty. You could certainly argue that, with a balanced hand and reasonable defense, it was more sensible to pass here, but at teams, players are often reluctant to sit for the double of a part-score into game.

The opening lead of the spade queen held the trick. Now Kaspar Konow (West) deliberately set up dummy’s spade 10 by leading a suit-preference jack at the second trick, since he knew that his partner’s delayed support was likely to be based on exactly a doubleton spade. Hence, he had to prepare the way for a spade ruff.

Madsen won his ace perforce and duly led a diamond (the higher of the minor suits) in order to ensure the ruff. There was still the diamond queen coming to the defense for the setting trick.

Notice that if East plays a club after winning his spade ace, declarer gets in to draw trumps at once, and the defenders lose their ruff.

This week’s themed deals are on the topic of suit-preference signals. There are standard situations where they should apply, the main ones being when giving partner a ruff or when you lead an honor against a suit contract and dummy has a singleton in the suit. However, there are many other scenarios where they come in handy, and today’s deal is one such example.

Imagine you find yourself in the hot seat as West. You are playing in the Mixed Board-a-Match Teams, where overtricks may be vital. You lead the diamond king, and in this context your partnership agreement (unlike this column’s) is that the ace is the normal lead from ace-king. So the king, if not from king-queen, suggests the ace-king doubleton — or that you are about to shift to a singleton.

You see a disturbingly good dummy. Partner contributes the two (odd number), and the diamond ace draws the three from partner. Do you trust partner and underlead your club holding for a possible diamond ruff? Susan Miller, playing with Bob Sartorius, did so, and her good play was rewarded when he won his king and gave her a diamond ruff for down one and a win on the board.

Partner’s lowest diamond at trick two should be suit preference, of course, but the additional reason Susan could underlead without worrying about the overtricks was that she had doubled four spades. Overtricks were then irrelevant, of course, so the underlead became much easier!