The deceptive possibilities arising from letting go a nine or a 10 at the strategic moment seem virtually limitless. On the following hand the maneuver was a well-tried one, but it scored a goal nonetheless.

After a heart lead to the ace, East had to find a diamond shift to beat the contract legitimately. Instead he played the normal-looking spade, which declarer won to lead a club to the jack. To created possible confusion for declarer, East dropped the club nine, trying to look like a man with the doubleton 10-9 of trumps.

It worked – though it probably should not have done. When you play at the US national championships it is a fair assumption that your opponents did not leave the farm earlier that day…

Seduced by the sight of the nine, declarer crossed to hand with a top spade and advanced the club queen, to the king and ace. Now declarer cashed the heart queen and led a low diamond. East hopped up with the diamond king, cashed the club 10 and played a third spade. Declarer could ruff in dummy, but was left with a diamond and heart still to lose.

It might seem that even after the trump misguess, South could have recovered. But declarer could not have succeeded even if she had left the heart queen in dummy as an entry to the diamonds. The defense play spades at every opportunity, and the heart blockage leaves her with a diamond loser at the end.

North-South cards might reasonably have played three no-trump here. This is a contract that makes if diamonds are 4-4 or if, as here, the player on lead has an unattractive three-card holding.

But at the table South showed a very strong hand with extra playing strength in hearts, by jumping to three no-trump. Had he held a strong balanced hand with a five-card suit in the 18-19 range, he would simply have bid two no-trump, so this sequence showed real extra playing strength. North guessed to convert to four hearts, a contract that looks very unlikely to make on accurate defense.

As it turned out, though, the 2-2 trump break gave declarer some interesting chances, based on the fact that both black suits are frozen — neither side can play on them without losing a trick.

Against four hearts West led a trump, not a bad move, as either black suit would have been immediately fatal, and declarer won to play a diamond. The defenders elected to win and play a second heart. When trumps broke, a second diamond saw whichever defender won the trick having to decide between opening up a black suit or play a diamond.

Since leading either black suit would have conceded the 10th trick, the defenders accurately played a third diamond. South ruffed, and played ace, king and a third spade. East had to win this trick, and now had to open up the clubs. South ran the lead round to the queen in dummy, and claimed the rest.

At matchpoint pairs it is often very hard to determine if you are in a normal contract, or an unusual one. In a standard contract, it is normal pairs tactics to consider playing for the maximum number of tricks. If you go down, you can at least console yourself that you were following a sensible strategy.

By contrast, at rubber bridge or at teams you want to follow the safest line for your contract, and as a defender you look for the guaranteed way to defeat a contract. That means the number of overtricks or undertricks is less important than beating or making the contract.

Today’s deal is a classic example. After North produced a jump raise of spades – which according to his partnership agreement was preemptive – South found himself in game. West had no reason not to lead the club queen, and South won the first trick and had to formulate a plan.

The obvious thing to do is to ruff clubs in dummy. Declarer trumped a club, led a diamond to the ace, and ruffed another club low. Then came the question of how to get back to hand: declarer chose the safest line of leading a heart to the ace, and ruffed the fourth club high. East could choose whether to discard or overruff, but declarer was sure to score four more trump tricks and make his contract.

Had declarer finessed in hearts, West would have won his king and sunk the contract by shifting to trump, to kill the third club ruff.

On this 1997 deal from the Cap Gemini tournament North comes home in five diamonds easily enough, by ruffing spades in dummy. However, at one table Marc Bompis declared three no-trump by North, after East-West had bid spades.

If the defense lead a spade to the queen and a spade back, declarer may not get a spade trick — but he can set up the diamonds while keeping West off play. However Gabriel Chagas and Marcello Branco found an ingenious variation. Branco led the spade ace and followed up with the spade 10, and Chagas ducked this!

Now Bompis had his spade trick, but declarer could no longer give up a diamond trick without letting the defenders cash out. He tested diamonds, then tried the heart finesse and went two down.

Finally, Alain Levy played four hearts, by South, against which Tor Helness led the spade king. At trick two he correctly switched to a club, and Levy won the ace and ruffed a spade. Then he played a club to the king and ruffed a club, took the diamond ace and played a fourth spade, overruffing East’s eight with the jack, and cashed just one top heart.

With eight tricks in the bag he now led a diamond from hand. Helness was forced to ruff, but whatever he did next, declarer would make his remaining small trump now, or later.

Have you noticed that there WAS a defense to beat the contract? East could have overtaken the spade lead and played a trump, to kill the club ruff in dummy.

In the 1998 Cap Gemini, Tony Forrester and Zia Mahmood went into a huge lead early on. But it had been whittled away, when this board appeared in the final match.

When the second-placed pair reached three no-trump, West led the heart jack in response to his partner’s opening bid. Declarer won with the king and misguessed the clubs. Back came the heart nine, ducked all round, and that was followed by a diamond to the king. Now the defense was ahead in the race to establish their long suit, and declarer had only eight tricks.

Here, though, the opening bid was a nebulous club, and the one diamond response an artificial negative, after which everything was natural. Krzysztof Martens led the diamond 10 to the king, East unblocking the queen.

Tony Forrester naturally cashed the club ace and led to his jack. He ducked the diamond continuation, throwing a heart from dummy, to leave East on play.

Now Marek Szymanowski made the natural play of switching to the spade queen, and Forrester won his king. He cashed the diamond ace, discarding another heart, and took his winning clubs. This reduced everyone down to five cards. Szymanowski had to keep three hearts, so just two spades. Forrester could now lead a spade, win the heart return with the ace and play a spade, to win the last two tricks.

Had East shifted to a heart at trick six, the results of the top two pairs would have been reversed.

At the Cap Gemini tournament in 1998 one of the contending pairs were Krzysztof Martens and Marek Szymanowski of Poland. Szymanowski is a very tricky opponent, and he produced an excellent false-card against the Hacketts.

After Szymanowski had opened a Polish Club with the East cards, showing clubs or a balanced hand in the 12-14 range, possibly with as few as two clubs, Jason Hackett elected to overcall a strong no-trump, suppressing his five-card major.

As a result he found himself in two no-trump, when his partner Justin Hackett produced an invitational sequence via Stayman. Martens did well to lead spades, the two suggesting a four-card suit, and declarer won the opening lead and played a heart to the nine — and Szymanowski took it with the king!

Then East cleared the spades, and Jason, not unnaturally, repeated the finesse in hearts, allowing the defense a second heart trick. Together with two spade winners and three diamond tricks, that meant two off. Note that if Szymanowski wins the heart jack at trick two, declarer uses dummy’s spade entry to finesse East out of the heart king, and makes eight tricks in comfort.

In retrospect, you might ask yourself if declarer was right to fall for the false-card. Declarer knows East has four spades; the only time the finesse would be necessary is if declarer had eight cards in the minors – which would have to be a 4=1=3=5 pattern or East would have opened one diamond. You make the call!

This deal comes from the 1997 Cap Gemini tournament. Clearly slam is nothing to write home about, since you need something favorable in both minors. Additionally, an initial spade lead causes you some real problems, since it is not clear what to throw on the top spades.

At one or two tables West simplified declarer’s task by leading a heart. However, on the spade lead found by Mark Bompis against Sun Ming of the Chinese ladies, declarer could and did succeed by a fine line.

It is very tempting to try to ruff two diamonds in dummy; if you do this, East can win the club ace and give his partner a ruff. Instead Sun won the spade ace, played a trump to hand, then continued by cashing the diamond ace and ruffing a diamond.

Now she ran the spades, throwing a heart and diamond away. When East ruffed the fourth spade it was with the club ace, allowing South to discard her last diamond.

In other words, declarer got rid of her three losing diamonds and her losing heart by ruffing one diamond and throwing the other three on the spades.

But even had East had a small trump left with which to ruff the fourth spade, declarer would have been able to overruff, and then would have been in good shape to ruff another diamond in dummy. So long as diamonds are 4-3, declarer can return to hand now and play another trump, to concede just one club trick.

On Vugraph at the 1997 Cap Gemini tournament I thought Bobby Levin found a nice play here. It is easy on hands like this simply to assume that you will not run into bad trump splits — and realize too late that you could have done something about it.

West’s initial double might strike some as foolhardy – put me in that group. While the contract of two clubs by West would have gone at least two down, maybe doubled, and two spades might have been a more comfortable spot for South, Levin played in three diamonds.

The defense started with three rounds of clubs. Levin ruffed in dummy and decided to tackle hearts at once, cashing the ace and king, then ruffing in hand. When the heart queen popped up from East, there was an even stronger indication that trumps were not going to split, since East had bid one no-trump, and West had made a take-out double, with five clubs and four hearts. Surely he therefore had three spades and one diamond.

Accordingly, Levin decided to continue with three rounds of spades. When everybody followed, declarer led the fourth round of hearts from dummy and discarded his spade when East, who was down to only his four trumps, ruffed with the diamond nine. In the three-card ending East was now endplayed to lead away from his trump honors. So Levin lost just one more trump trick and came home with his contract.

What makes for an exciting bridge tournament for spectators? The 1997 Cap Gemini event, at The Hotel Des Indes in The Hague, certainly qualified. The field of 16 pairs included an enviable array of talent; eight of the 16 pairs had reached the final stages of the recent world Championships in Rhodes. All the hands this week are from the 1997 and 1998 tournaments.

The format of the event over three days was 15 head to head matches in a round-robin format. While the field was bunched at the end of the second day, the last day of the tournament was dominated by Gabriel Chagas and Marcelo Branco, who won their last three matches conclusively to finish up comfortable winners at the end. They demonstrated that even when their opponents stayed cautiously low against them, it was still possible to bring a little sorcery to bear against them.

This is not an easy hand on which to stay out of trouble; five out of the eight pairs bid to a small slam which is about 40%. But Enri Leufkens and Berry Westra managed to stop at the five level, and Branco led a club to Chagas’s ace. Gabriel immediately returned the heart jack! Can you blame declarer for rising with the ace? After all, he was safe against anything but 3-0 trump, and the threat of the heart ruff was sufficiently high, he thought, to make this the right play. He will know better next time.