The auction may look bucolic — essentially South drives to slam facing an opening bid. But he cannot judge exactly which cards his partner has, so gambling on slam seems reasonable; it is, after all, unlikely to be worse than a finesse.

South uses Blackwood after forcing to game and setting spades as trump. When North shows one ace South sees that one ace is missing and contents himself with the small slam.

What would you lead with that West hand? A trump seems sensible; it is unlikely to take a finesse for declarer that he cannot take himself. My second choice is a diamond, my third choice would be the club ace.

When dummy comes down, South must form a plan and count his tricks. He should determine he has 11 top tricks; the 12th trick may come from a club or from an established heart. Best is to win the trump lead, then play off your two top hearts and ruff a heart high (noting that the suit splits 4-3). Now lead a spade to the 10 — you did not waste that card at trick one did you? Ruff another heart, draw the rest of the trump and throw your second and third clubs on the long heart and long diamond. You can give up a club and note, to your pleasure and relief that both the key honors there were offside.

Of course, if the hearts had failed to break, South would be in position to lead a club from dummy, instead of cashing the heart jack.

Today’s deal saw a top class pair miss a spectacularly challenging defense; can you do better?

Against four hearts West began with a top diamond, planning a heart shift if diamonds appeared unpromising. When East echoed in diamonds, West led out two more top diamonds, assuming that East might not encourage diamonds if he did not want his partner to lead a third round of the suit.

If dummy had ruffed low, East would have overruffed and returned a trump, taking out dummy’s sole entry before the hearts could be unblocked. Discarding from dummy would be no better, for East could then pitch a club, and ruff the third round of clubs, leaving South a trick short.

Accordingly, South ruffed in with dummy’s spade king and East discarded. Now declarer drew two rounds of trump with the ace and queen, cashed the club ace and exited with the spade two to endplay East for either a club discard or a lead away from the heart king.

Could, or should, East have done better? South is surely marked with his actual spade holding and the missing aces. The only way the contract can be in jeopardy is if the clubs are blocked, in which case East can see the looming endplay.

East must not only underruff with the jack when the spade king is played, he must follow up by playing the spade 10 on the first round of trump. Now declarer will finish a trick short. If you found this defense, congratulations – this might be the hardest problem of the year!

The auction to four spades sees North first make a negative double and then raise spades, to invite game. After West’s top club lead, South’s problem is how to tackle the black suits.

He must win the first trick in dummy with the club king, to prevent the defenders from being able to ruff out his side’s remaining club honor. After all, West is marked with long clubs, and East may well have a singleton. If South wins the first club in his hand and leads a spade, West will take the spade ace and lead the club jack through dummy’s king. East will then ruff away the club king, leaving declarer with two eventual losers.

After winning the first trick in dummy, South should next cross to his hand for the first play in spades. West is favorite from the auction to hold the spade ace. If the ace is singleton, South would like to lead a low spade from his own hand and see the ace fall on empty air.

But South must avoid the next trap, by coming to his hand with the heart ace (not the diamond ace, which would open up lines of communication for East-West) in order to lead a low trump. As hoped, West’s spade ace pops up. The defenders can lead another club, allowing East to ruff, but he gets to ruff a loser rather than a winner.

East can now try to cross to his partner’s hand with a diamond for another ruff. However, South can win the diamond ace, draw trump, and claim.

When a defender offers you an early ruff and discard, your first reaction should be to expect a defensive error or an awkward trump break. Here after West had opened the bidding with one heart, East was able to make a pre-emptive raise to three hearts. With a high-card limit raise he would have bid a conventional two no-trump.

Undaunted, South blasted his way to four spades, and West began the defense with ace, king and a third heart. He knew that East held four hearts, and little, if anything, in the way of high cards, so establishing trump control looked the best way to set the game.

The ruff and discard alerted declarer to the probable bad trump break. If West had acefourth of spades, South could see the risk of being forced. Since he needed a ‘substitute’ trump suit to counter this threat he discarded dummy’s low club and ruffed the third heart in hand.

The king and queen of trumps followed, West correctly withholding the ace, and the expected 4-1 break was revealed. But next came the ace and queen of clubs, followed by two rounds of diamonds, ending in hand.

Once West had followed twice in each minor, South could run the rest of his clubs, and West was helpless. If he ruffed in, he would be overruffed in dummy; so he pitched a heart, and dummy discarded a diamond. When West discarded again on the club jack, North’s last diamond went away, and dummy scored a trump trick at the end for the 10th winner.

As West you are playing teams, using standard leads and signals. Against three no-trump you lead the club 10, since South has not promised real clubs. Declarer plays the queen from dummy and overtakes with the king as partner follows with the three. Now comes a low diamond to dummy and declarer advances the heart jack.

On this trick East plays the heart nine under the jack and you win the trick with the king. What next?

West should analyze the hand and try to count declarer’s tricks. Partner’s discouraging club at trick one suggests three club tricks, three diamonds and three heart tricks for declarer. Since East would not follow with the heart nine if he had begun with four, East has to have only two hearts — leaving four hearts for South.

West also knows that East has at least four spades, since South didn’t support that suit. Therefore spades are the only chance for the defense. West must lead out the spade king and return the spade four, hoping to find East with ace-queen-fourth of spades together with the jack 10 or nine, or with four decent spades and the heart ace. Either way, this defense may set up the four additional tricks the defenders need.

Today, the defense takes one heart and four spade tricks to set the contract. This defense may not work but it is the only chance.

Note declarer’s sacrifice of a club winner to try to persuade you to continue the suit; but you didn’t fall for it – did you?

Today’s deal sees a combination of plays that range between relatively difficult and considerably more challenging. If both defenders can do their part, then they can conjure defensive tricks almost from nowhere.

Against three no-trump West leads the spade 10 and sees East follow with the six, a very hard card to read, since it could easily be the start of an encouraging signal.

West is back in the spotlight when South wins his king and leads a heart to trick two; West must play the heart king to kill the heart suit and prevent South having an easy route to a ninth trick. After all, if South has the heart queen the heart suit is coming in whatever West does.

What can South do now? As the cards lie he must win the trick and probably does best to duck a diamond. Now West has another problem. The easy way to defeat the contract is to shift to clubs, but if he opts for passive defense he should play back a heart, letting East win the queen and exit with the spade jack.

Now even when spades break 3-3 declarer will have no choice but to rely on the club king being onside in order to try to reach dummy. Today his luck will be out.

As an aside, if East does not unblock the spade jack on the second round of the suit, declarer might guess to cash off his diamond winners and endplay East with the spade jack to lead away from the club king. Now that would be embarrassing!

Today’s deal from a team game saw North take an aggressive position to drive to game facing a strong no-trump. His good club spots persuaded him to go high rather than to explore, and give the opponents a chance to overcall or double an artificial call.

Now switch to the South seat. When West leads the diamond four against three no-trump, plan the play.

You appear to be well on your way to nine tricks: three spades, two red aces, and at least four club tricks. Even a 4-0 club break onside won’t necessarily cause you any problems.

The only real danger may come from a 5-2 diamond break, when you might lose four diamonds and a club. In some circumstances it would be right for you to duck the first trick but not here. That is because if you are going to lose the lead via the failing club finesse, it would be to West.

Since you cannot keep West off lead, can you block the diamonds? You may well be able to do so. East might have begun with a doubleton queen or jack of course, in which case you are sunk, but otherwise he will surely have two of the four missing high diamonds. If so, then when you rise with the diamond ace at once, West won’t be able to cash four diamonds even if he does get in with the club king. So win trick one with the diamond ace and take the club finesse. As the cards lie, the finesse loses, but the defenders cannot run the diamonds.

This week’s deal all come from the Macallan tournament in London 20 years ago. Today’s deal carries a salutary lesson for me. I was declarer, and still remember a missed opportunity to put one over on my then-teammates.

Playing with Bob Hamman, we took on Jeff Meckstroth and Eric Rodwell, and we edged them out, despite this missed opportunity. See if you can do better as South than me. You may choose to cover up the East and West cards, to try to duplicate the problem I faced at the table.

You reach three no-trump after East has shown a weak-two bid in spades, and receive the lead of the club six. What would you play from dummy? If you play the seven, well done; East plays the king. Which red suit is it right to play on at trick two?

All right, I admit that I was (mis)leading the witness. The key to the hand is that you need to duck the first trick, or you will go down like a stone.

The hand is truly a complex one, but the right way to look at it is that if clubs are 4-2 you will need the heart queen to be onside, whether you win or duck the first trick. (If it is not, you will lose two clubs, two hearts and a diamond).

However, if clubs are 5-1, you prevent the opponents from establishing clubs by ducking the first trick. Now you will succeed unless West has all the missing red honors – and if that were the case you were never making your contract.