We showed a deal from a Vanderbilt match between Hawkins and Pavlicek yesterday. The Pavlicek team had their revenge a deal or two later when the defenders ducked one too many times, and Bob Jones read the cards accurately to land a difficult contract.

West led the club 10 to the queen, jack and two. Jones played the diamond jack, which West decided to duck. Next came a low spade from dummy, and it was East’s turn to duck. Declarer won the jack and cashed the diamond ace. Next came Jones’ singleton heart, and West played low — this was the duck that was fatal to the defense, though it was very hard to see why at the time.

The heart king held the trick, and Jones, reading the layout with great accuracy, cashed the spade ace, extracting West’s last exit card. Then he played a low heart from dummy to West’s ace.

West could cash the club ace and play the club 10 to Jones’ king, but he put her back in with a fourth round of clubs, forcing a lead away from the diamond queen at trick 12 into his king-10 of diamonds.

To defeat the contract, it was necessary for West to rise with the heart ace on the first round of the suit. From that point on, West could exit with the low heart or with a spade. (It would even have been possible to cash the club ace before playing her spade). At that point, Jones would have been unable to achieve the multiple endplays he needed.

In the 2004 Philadelphia Vanderbilt, the team captained by Richard Pavlicek took over the No. 1 seed in the event by defeating the Jim Foster team, which in turn had eliminated the defending Vanderbilt champions captained by Reese Milner in the previous round. Here, however, is one of the boards where the Foster team gained a game swing.

Against three no-trump, Mike Kamil led a heart in response to his partner’s bid. When Marty Fleisher as East correctly put in the jack, Allen Hawkins, declarer, took the trick with his queen. He led the club queen, which was ducked, but when he tried a second club to the jack, it lost to the ace.

Fleisher now thoughtfully tried to cut declarer’s communications by shifting to the spade jack, won in dummy with the queen. At this point, declarer seemed to be in rather poor shape. He could have cashed the second spade in dummy, but instead he decided to strand the spade ace by calling for a small diamond from dummy. When Fleisher rose with the king, Hawkins ducked. Fleisher switched back to hearts, leading the 10, and Hawkins took his king.

When declarer now cashed his three good clubs, he caught East in a strip-squeeze.

In the four-card ending, if Fleisher discarded down to two hearts, he could be endplayed with a heart to lead away from his diamonds. If he discarded a diamond, as he did, declarer could cash both the ace and jack. Either way, Hawkins would make his game.

The defense have a number of tactics and strategies available to them in trumps — for example, the ruff and the uppercut. It is rare for one and the same defender to get an extra trick from both strategies, but today’s deal from the second qualifying session of the national Open Pairs at the Philadelphia Nationals showed the defenders scoring well by doing just that.

In third seat, South opened one spade — after all, most macho men believe in four-card majors in third seat! West overcalled two hearts without much enthusiasm, but pairs events require you to do this sort of thing, and North had an easy bid of two spades. How bad can it be to finish up at the two-level here? Plenty bad, as you’ll see.

West led a diamond to the 10 and queen, and East cashed his diamond ace and gave his partner a ruff. Now the heart ace and a heart to the king saw declarer run the club jack to West’s king. West cashed the heart queen, then led another heart. Dummy ruffed with the six, and East over-ruffed with the eight, forcing declarer to over-ruff with his jack.

South next cashed the club ace and ruffed the club queen in dummy. He then led dummy’s last trump to the queen and West’s ace. Now West led his last heart at trick 12, and East ruffed in with the 10. When declarer over-ruffed, West’s spade nine took the contract down three tricks for plus 300 and 90 percent of the available matchpoints.

Here is a might-have-been from the Philadelphia Nationals. The deal was reported anonymously to the Daily Bulletin, and it features an intriguing possibility.

As South, cover up the East and West cards. Your mundane part-score suddenly becomes interesting at trick two. West leads the spade two to the ace, and back comes the spade seven, ruffed with the heart three. West obediently follows his partner’s suit-preference signal in spades to cash the diamond king and play a second diamond to East’s ace. When the spade six comes through you, you ruff with the eight, and West throws a club. Over to you.

You need to hold your heart losers to one in order to make your contract. If West had both honors, he would certainly have over-ruffed, so you should play East for one or both honors.

One possibility is to cross to dummy via a club to the ace and run the heart queen.

Better, perhaps (assuming that East must surely have the heart jack), is to play a heart to the queen. If it loses to the king, you can cross to the club ace and finesse the heart 10.

This line looks safe against almost any normal lie of the cards, but, as you can see, it would not work today. If West refuses to over-ruff on the third round of spades with the jack, wouldn’t you say he deserves to beat the contract? Alas, West was only good enough to find the play in the bar after the event, not to make it at the table.

Today’s deal from a past national event comes from the last day of the National Swiss Teams, and shows Zia Mahmood in an unfamiliar role as the victim, being the reporter of a fine play against him, rather than the perpetrator, this time.

Both tables in the match between Mahaffey and Schwartz reached six spades with East-West silent. In one room, East doubled the slam, making the play somewhat easier after a heart lead, though in fact declarer lost his way when he played clubs in routine fashion for down one.

In the other room, Jim Mahaffey was not doubled by Mahmood, since it sounded as if North-South were looking for a grand slam, as indeed they were.

Michael Rosenberg still found the heart lead, and Mahmood ruffed, then exited with a diamond. Declarer won, drew trumps ending in hand in two rounds, cashed the heart king, then advanced the club queen. When West played low, Mahaffey decided that since neither opponent had bid, East was relatively unlikely to have more than six diamonds. Accordingly, the club finesse was heavily favored to be offside, but the double club finesse had suddenly become an excellent chance. He needed to find West with only small clubs or the doubleton 10.

He overtook his club queen with the ace, cashed dummy’s two top hearts to pitch his club losers, and ran the club jack, prepared to repeat the finesse if Mahmood covered. Mahmood ducked the club jack, but Mahaffey ran it anyway and brought home his slam.

This week’s deals all come from national championship events from Philadelphia.

As West, you deal and pass, then hear one diamond on your left and one heart on your right. You bid two clubs, which produces two hearts on your left and four hearts on your right. You lead your singleton spade and see the diagramed dummy.

That opening spade lead goes to the six, partner’s seven and declarer’s queen. To your pleasure, declarer plays a heart to the ace, then a heart back to her jack as your partner pitches the spade four. What next?

The correct defense is to lead a low diamond now rather than the ace. You need partner to have the diamond king, and given that this is a teams event, you must assume he will know to rise with his king rather than duck (since if declarer has the ace, he cannot beat the game). Your natural play seems to be to play the diamond ace and 10, but when your partner wins the trick, how would he know you wanted a spade ruff, not a diamond ruff? Conversely, if you lead the diamond nine to his king, he won’t have any option but to get the defense right — you hope.

The good news on this occasion is that because your partner started with all the small spades, he will be able to read that you initially led a singleton and that you want a spade ruff — you may not be so lucky next time! To see what I mean, imagine that the spade two and nine were switched.

You declare four spades, after your partner has shown restraint in not going past game. It would be a shame to disappoint him by failing to take 10 tricks, wouldn’t it? West cashes the club king and ace, with East discarding a heart on the second club. West continues with the club jack, and East lets go of a second heart. Clearly, there will be 10 easy tricks if spades are 3-2, since you will be able to draw trumps, cash dummy’s diamonds and ruff a club back to hand to cash the diamond jack. The heart ace will be your 10th trick.

But when trumps are 4-1, the diamond blockage may be inconvenient. You could rely on diamonds being 3-3, but there is a much better chance.

Suppose the full deal is along the lines of the one shown here. After ruffing the third club, you cash the trump ace and king to discover that they do indeed break badly. Next you play the queen and nine of trumps, being careful to discard dummy’s heart ace on the second one!

Now after cashing dummy’s three diamond winners, you will lead dummy’s heart three toward your hand. East will take his heart king, but your diamond and heart winners win the last two tricks. In total, you will make five trumps, four diamonds and a heart trick for a total of 10 winners.

Once East is known to hold the heart king from the auction, but to be out of clubs, this line of play basically becomes a sure thing, regardless of the red-suit breaks.

In today’s deal, North and South disagreed about what South’s three-heart rebid might have suggested. Was it good hearts or doubt about the best game? Be that as it may, South’s slam was a particularly unattractive spot; declarer had to assume a very specific lie of the cards even to give himself a chance to come home.

When West led the heart jack against six diamonds, declarer saw there appeared to be a heart and a club loser. He played low from dummy, and if East had risen with the ace, declarer’s problems would have been solved, as North’s second club could have been discarded on the heart queen.

However, when East defended correctly by ducking the first trick, South won with the queen. He appreciated that East was sure to hold the heart ace, since West was unlikely to have underled it against a slam. His best chance was that East also held the club king, in which case he could be the target of an endplay.

So South set about eliminating the pointed suits. He crossed to the spade ace, then ruffed a spade high. A low diamond to the nine was followed by another spade ruff high. Crossing to the dummy in trumps again, he took the spade king, on which he threw a heart.

Now the stage was set to exit with the heart king, endplaying East. He was forced either to present declarer with a ruff-sluff, whereupon dummy’s second club could be discarded, or to play a club, allowing dummy’s queen to score.

Today’s deal cropped up in the finals of the 2012 Women’s World Championships between England and Russia.

Both tables declared four spades rather than the simpler contract of three no-trump. When Susan Stockdale was South, West led the heart 10. Stockdale won with dummy’s ace and advanced the spade queen. When that held, she played a spade to her 10 and drew the outstanding trump, while West discarded the heart two.

Now declarer followed the sound principle of eliminating the side suits by cashing her top hearts, with East discarding an encouraging diamond. Declarer exited with the diamond jack, and West put up the king and returned the 10 for the eight, five and ace.

South now exited with a diamond, and when East won to play a club, she ducked. She knew the defenders would be able to take only one club, since West would be endplayed on winning her club honor.

When Natalia Ponomareva for Russia was declarer, West also led a top heart, and the play to the first six tricks was identical. But when South led the diamond jack, Nevena Senior as West made a good play by ducking. Now Heather Dhondy was able to win and switch to the club six, which Senior won with her king to return a devious diamond 10, rather than the king.

Declarer assumed that East had the diamond king, so she ducked, hoping West had no more diamonds. But now Senior could exit with the diamond king, and declarer had to lose another club trick eventually.