North made a Michaels cuebid to show the majors over West’s light opener in third seat, and South judged his spade king and ruffing value in hearts to be worth a mild invite of three spades. This was sensible: Even though one of the minor-suit kings would probably be wasted, the other might be working overtime, as here. North had an easy raise to game.

West’s singleton heart lead went to dummy’s ace. Now declarer, seeking to ruff a heart in hand, correctly crossed to hand with the spade king to lead a second heart through the void. West intelligently pitched a diamond, unwilling to ruff thin air, and after scoring the heart king, South made another careful play when he called for the spade ace.

Only then did declarer ruff a heart in hand. The play of the spade ace had the effect of extracting West’s safe exit card, so he could no longer over-ruff and exit passively in the trump suit. Nevertheless, West chose to over-ruff immediately and found the best continuation of a small club.

With the clubs blocked, declarer could not immediately benefit from this, but he found a counter. He rose with dummy’s club ace, then led a club to his 10. That left West on lead without resource. He had to establish an extra trick for declarer in one minor or the other, along with an entry.

It would not have helped West not to over-ruff the third heart. South would have crossed to the club ace and thrown West on lead with a spade to produce the same ending.

The successful declarer always looks for a way to augment his chances. In today’s deal, South found himself at the helm in four hearts after North set up a game force at his first turn. South showed his major-suit pattern without promising extras, then each player looked to extract support from their partner for their long suit. South won the day when North fessed up to a doubleton heart honor.

Having to choose between the pointed suits on lead, West opted for the unbid one and put a low diamond on the table. Declarer could see a spade and two trump losers on the likely 3-2 split; but if he could ruff one spade in dummy, that would give him two spade tricks, three minor-suit winners, one ruff and four trump tricks, for 10 in all.

However, South was not prepared to settle for that: He sought to find a way home even if hearts split 4-1. Aiming to set up dummy’s clubs, declarer won the diamond in hand and ruffed a spade at trick three, then followed with a low club, which he ruffed small. He returned to the heart ace and ruffed another low club in hand, then gave up a trump, East showing out. West could draw two more rounds of trumps, but dummy discarded the losing diamond; when clubs broke, South had the rest. The extra chance of an even club split had paid dividends.

Note declarer’s good technique in keeping the club ace in dummy. This way, he did not risk conceding an over-ruff or trump promotion if clubs were 4-2 and trumps 3-2.

North-South bid to a pushy four-spade contract here when South up-valued his heart honors in his partner’s suit and, expecting the missing club honors to be on his left, bid one more for the road.

After cashing the top clubs and receiving an odd count-signal from his partner, West found the excellent defense of the diamond ace and another diamond, attacking the late entry to dummy. West’s defense was based on the fact that East had followed with his lowest club at his second turn, suggesting more interest in the lower of the red suits.

Upon winning with the diamond king, declarer saw he needed to dispose of his remaining diamond on a heart. One line was to unblock the heart ace-king, finesse the spade 10 and cash the spade ace before playing the heart queen. That would succeed when West had the spade queen and either hearts were 3-3 or West had doubletons in each major. For this to work, assuming the clubs were 6-3 as the carding had suggested, West would need to have only two spades.

If that were the case, East would have the long spades, which made it more likely that the spade queen was on declarer’s right. Looking at each player’s cards outside the club suit supported that reasoning, East having 10 unknown cards to West’s seven.

So declarer called for the spade 10 from dummy at trick five and let it run. He then unblocked the top hearts and returned to the spade ace to throw his remaining diamond on the heart queen. When West was unable to ruff, the game was home.

Nothing would tempt me to open the North hand, but at the table, the player with those cards did not see it that way, and a poor game was reached.

West kicked off passively against four spades with the trump jack. Declarer had no immediately obvious way of disposing of his losing heart, as the club king was more likely on his left. South decided his best chance was to arrange an endplay against West. He therefore sought to eliminate the hearts without letting East on lead for a club switch.

Declarer won the trump lead in dummy and led a low heart. East played small, and so did South. Upon winning with the heart 10, West exited with a heart to the ace. Declarer crossed to the table with the trump eight, ruffed a heart, played another trump to the queen and ran the diamond 10 to West’s jack.

After cashing the diamond ace, West was caught between a rock and a hard place.

A club continuation would float around to the queen, and declarer would then need only to ruff a diamond in dummy. West could place both red-suit queens with his partner, so South had to have the club queen. Therefore, West’s only chance was to concede a ruff-and-discard by leading a heart, hoping his partner had the diamond eight.

No such luck. Declarer ruffed in dummy, throwing his club loser, and finessed in diamonds to make his game.

Do you think West could have figured out to play the diamond ace and another diamond at trick three, to escape the endplay?

North took the scientific route on today’s hand, responding one diamond and continuing with two spades over his partner’s twoclub rebid. North was showing a concentration in spades and some concern about hearts. In auctions like this one, the third suit shows values in the suit bid, while the fourth suit asks for a stopper.

Three no-trump was thus reached the right way up to protect the heart tenace, and West chose to lead dummy’s second suit, with the idea of leading to declarer’s weakness. This attack would be more attractive from a five-card or even a three-card holding (hoping to hit partner’s five-card suit). All too often, four-card suits set up winners, but not quickly enough to beat three no-trump. Then again, our recommended heart lead would give declarer no problems.

Today, though, the spade did pose a difficult challenge. Declarer could count eight tricks once the club ace was removed. The heart suit posed a threat, however. If West held the heart king and East gained the lead to shift through declarer’s heart tenace, the game would be defeated.

It followed that declarer had to keep East off lead at any cost. South therefore called for the spade king. This was safe even when West had led from the spade ace-queen. After all, the spade two lead was a strong indication that the suit was splitting evenly.

When the spade king held, all declarer had to do was knock out the club ace. The defense could score only three spades and a club trick.

In today’s deal, North-South found their way to the no-trump game. At his second turn, South sensibly elected to emphasize his spades because of his suitoriented honor structure and his small doubleton in clubs, but still ended up in no-trump when North tried for the nine-trick game rather than raising his partner — a good idea today. But declarer still needed to decide which suit to go after and how to avoid blockages to bring his game home.

West’s lead of the heart queen removed dummy’s only outside entry to the diamonds. With seven sure tricks, a 3-3 spade break would suffice; however, diamonds seemed to offer a sounder chance.

A close examination of the diamond pips showed that even some 4-1 breaks might not present an insuperable problem. South focused on West holding the four-card suit with East a singleton honor.

Accordingly, at trick two South cashed dummy’s diamond ace and, when the queen dropped from East, he was careful to play the nine to this trick to keep the suit fluid. Next came a low diamond to South’s eight. If West took this trick, declarer would later finesse dummy’s seven. So West played low to cut declarer off from dummy.

Nicely defended, but it was not quite good enough. South switched horses and played low spades from both hands to make sure he could untangle his winners. With four spade tricks to come when that suit behaved, he was home.

We end our week of deals from the 2014 European Team Championships with what turned out to be the pivotal board in deciding the top spot in the open section. The featured match was between Israel and Monaco.

In both rooms, North opened three diamonds, but only the Monaco North-South ended in five diamonds. There were no problems in the play in that contract. Even on the spade king lead, declarer could unblock the heart king, cross to dummy in clubs and throw his losing spade on the heart ace before drawing trumps — plus 400.

The three no-trump contract at the other table was a more exciting affair. Declarer took the club jack lead in hand and conceded a diamond to East’s queen. Tor Helness returned the spade king. Declarer won with the ace, unblocked the heart king and reached his hand with a club.

The moment of truth had arrived, as the fate of the contract depended on a heart guess. After the heart ace, should declarer play for an opponent to have started with queen-third or with 10-third? The penalty for guessing wrong would have been 10 IMPs, but South got it right by leading out the jack to pin the 10, and Israel earned a push. They beat the reigning European champions by just enough to take the gold medal.

Had West hit on a spade lead, declarer might have gone after diamonds first, which would have conceded a vital tempo. That would have rejigged the final standings.

This hand from the 2014 European Team Championships in Croatia demonstrates the importance of constructing the unseen hands.

Geir Helgemo’s one-club opening did little to keep his Norwegian opponents from reaching the heart game. Espen Lindqvist doubled for take-out, and Boye Brogeland set up a forcing auction with his two-club cue-bid. South showed his spades first, then bid three hearts over the two no-trump advance, raised to game by North.

Tor Helness led the club three, and Helgemo took two winners in the suit before cashing the spade ace and continuing with a spade to declarer’s king. Lindqvist ruffed a spade with the heart 10 and drew trumps in three rounds, ending in hand. He then cashed the spade queen, confirming the layout of that suit.

Declarer needed to avoid a diamond loser. As if by magic, Lindqvist led the diamond jack and ran the card, pulling off a backward finesse! Plus 620 and 12 IMPs were his.

Why did he make this play? He knew Helgemo from his days of playing for Norway before transferring his loyalty to Monaco, so he was aware of his predilection for opening one no-trump at the slightest drop of a hat. If East held the diamond queen as part of a 3=2=2=6 hand containing the black-suit honors already shown, he would have been in range for a slightly off-center one no-trump opening bid. It is hard to argue with success, isn’t it?

On today’s deal from the 2014 European Team Championships in Croatia, the final contract was the same in each room, but the outcomes were very different.

Both Norths drove their partners to game in hearts, and each West led a low diamond. Easts Gabor Winkler for Hungary and Vladimir Mihov for Bulgaria both won with the king and switched to a club honor.

Mihov led the club 10 to the queen, king and ace. Declarer cashed the spade king, ruffed a diamond and threw a club loser on the spade ace. Next, he ruffed a spade, before conceding a club to Mihov’s jack. South ruffed the diamond return, ruffed a club and led a heart to the queen. When Julian Stefanov (West) won with the king and returned a heart to the ace, declarer was left with a diamond loser and was one down for minus 50.

In the other room, Winkler switched to the club jack, and declarer Georgi Mihailov withheld his queen. He won with the ace, cashed the spade king, ruffed a diamond, and cashed the spade ace, pitching a club from dummy. Next came a spade ruff, a diamond ruff, and another spade. When West produced the 13th spade, Mihailov discarded dummy’s last club rather than risking an over-ruff.

East also threw a club, and West led the club king, which declarer ruffed. When Mihailov took the losing heart finesse, he could ruff the club return with the jack and cross to the heart ace. The 2-2 trump split meant that he could cash the spade 10 for his game-going trick, and a big swing to Bulgaria.