Although it can often be right to play in three no-trump when you have a 5-3 major-suit fit, it helps to have strength or length in all the side-suits. On this deal from a team of eight contest two pairs went down in three no-trump after a top club lead. The other two pairs played in the right strain, spades, but the bidding subsided at the two-level.

However, what line of play would give the best chance of making four spades? It seems right to assume that trump will break 3-2. The total of winners is nine – so from where will the 10th trick materialize?

The suit to go after should be hearts. They might break 3-3, but one trick must always be lost. However, even if they don’t break so helpfully, the fourth heart can perhaps be ruffed on the table – so long as you time the play correctly.

West will surely lead the club queen against four spades. The best way forward, which caters for most eventualities, is to win, then play a low heart, ducking in hand. The opponents will doubtless cash their club trick, but their next play puts you in control. Win, play off the spade ace and king, then take the two top hearts and if necessary ruff your heart loser with dummy’s last trump. The defenders will make a trump trick, but that is all.

Note: if you cash either one or two top hearts early, then whether you play trumps or not, you will no longer be able to find a winning line, as the cards lie.

Since the defenders have the advantage of being on lead to trick one, they can strike the first blow, even if that blow is often wrongly aimed.

When the board first appeared in a head-to-head match, one table had a relatively easy time of things in three no-trump. When after South opened one diamond, it deterred West from leading a diamond. After a club lead, declarer could dislodge the heart king in safety.

However, a minority of duplicate players espouse the 12-14 one no-trump opening, which was the case at the other table. Now West led a low diamond to the king, and back came the diamond eight. Now put yourself in declarer’s position. If diamonds are breaking 4-4, there will be no problem. The defenders can come to at most three diamond tricks, plus the heart king, if that card is poorly located. The distribution to guard against is running into 5-3 diamonds, with the heart king over the ace.

If you rise with the queen or jack at trick two, West will duck. When the heart finesse loses, the diamond return through South’s remaining jack-nine will give the race to the defenders.

The solution is to play the nine on the second round of diamonds. West wins with the 10, but the defensive communications have been cut. The defenders can take three diamonds and the heart king, but no more.

Incidentally, if the heart king and ace are interchanged, the problem for declarer of whether to play a diamond honor at trick two is considerably more complex.

I’m not going to specify precisely where Australian Michael Courtney falls on the spectrum of genius and madness, but he deservedly won the 2010 International Bridge Press Association Declarer Play of the Year award for his play on today’s deal.

Michael is a true maverick, capable of making extemporaneous plays that other experts would never see – of course, not all of them are successful, but that is part of his charm.

Against three no-trump West led the spade six, and Michael made the natural but unsuccessful play of covering with the 10. The first trick went to the jack and king, and Michael now took the losing diamond finesse. East thought it a good idea to cash his top heart winners before returning a spade, in case declarer had the spade ace and not the heart queen, so he led the heart king. West wanted to be sure that East would not play him for the heart queen, so he dropped the jack on this trick.

Michael knew from the rule of 11 that East must hold another spade, so he could see that his priority was to stop East leading another spade. Accordingly, when East continued with the heart ace, Michael dropped the queen – leaving hearts wide open as well as spades – but now West unblocked the 10 of course, ‘knowing’ his partner must have the heart nine.

East was now convinced that West must have started with J-109-fourth of hearts and thus continued with a third heart. Michael won his nine and claimed nine tricks.

Goldilocks has taken over running the weekly duplicate in the forest. She also organizes a seminar after the game, where experts can discuss the trickier deals.

Today’s hand was the subject for some discussion amongst the Three Bears. Papa Bear had declared four spades on repeated diamond leads. He ruffed the second diamond and drew four rounds of trumps, then played a club. West ducked the first and second club, and now declarer could not avoid forcing himself, so the hand fell to pieces.

By contrast, Mama Bear drew trump, it taking four rounds to do so, and during the course of this, discarded dummy’s club king and queen. She still found herself in trouble, though, as West’s club spots were fractionally too good for her. West captured the club jack with the ace and returned a diamond, ruffed by South with her last trump. But when the clubs failed to run, eight tricks was the limit of the hand.

Baby Bear appreciated that the missing clubs were more likely than not to break 4-2. He played a club to dummy at his first opportunity – which was at trick three. It would have been well against the odds to find clubs breaking 5-1 or 6-0, when the defenders could have maneuvered a ruff.

When West won the club ace and forced declarer again, declarer could draw trumps, meanwhile discarding dummy’s blocking second club. Now 10 tricks were easy. Equally, had West ducked the first club, declarer would simply have drawn trumps, discarding the club, as before.

Today’s deal sees Nicola Smith of England in the hot seat as declarer. Smith is currently the most successful woman bridge player in the world – though Jill Meyers of the US is close behind her.

East’s offbeat two diamond opening showed a weak two-bid (normally six cards) in either major. Smith’s two hearts was natural, North’s two spade bid was a cuebid showing a strong hand. In the end North closed her eyes and hoped that her partner’s hearts were good enough for slam.

When West led the spade six, it is easy to see that declarer could have succeeded easily enough by playing to ruff a spade in the dummy. However, understandably, declarer expected West would be able to ruff in on the third round of spades.

So she won the spade lead and played a trump. East correctly went in with the ace and played a second trump. Smith won in dummy, cashed the diamond ace and king, discarding a club and ruffed a diamond. She then ran off all her trump.

Her last three cards in hand were a trump, a club and the spade jack; in dummy she had two clubs and a diamond. When she cashed the last trump West had to come down to a singleton club in order to keep the master diamond; East also had to come to a singleton club in order to keep the master spade, so dummy’s club queen was sure to win trick 13. It was a classic double squeeze.

Imagine you are playing four spades here, in a team game, on the lead of the club queen. How would you plan the play?

At one table declarer saw nothing better than taking the spade finesse at trick two. East lost no time in winning and shifting to the heart queen, South covered and the defenders took their heart ruff. East could now exit in clubs, and declarer was reduced to taking the diamond finesse. When it failed, so did the contract.

However, declarer had missed a subtle extra chance for his game, and the declarer in the other room managed to spot the winning line. All South had to do was to cash his second club winner at trick two, eliminating that suit from both hands. Now when East arranged to take his heart ruff, he was firmly endplayed, since he had no trumps or hearts to lead, and a club would allow declarer to discard one diamond from dummy via the ruffsluff, and one on the fourth heart. Stripping out the clubs had completed the endplay at no cost, and this time it made the difference between success and failure.

The alternative line, of playing ace and another spade, might cost the contract if the heart queen and diamond king were wrongly placed. So even though it might succeed (and you might consider rising with the spade ace against a weak defender if you led the spade queen from hand and West ducked smoothly) it is certainly not the percentage line.

Once North splinters with four clubs he should pull in his horns at his next turn. 4-4-4-1 distribution rarely plays as well as it might be expected to. Be that as it may, against six spades West leads the trump 10. Are there any hidden traps to making 12 tricks?

Assuming that trumps are 3-2, you have 10 tricks. Two more will come from club ruffs, but you need to be careful when the full deal looks similar to the one shown below.

The opening trump lead must be won on table, with the king. Next play a club to the ace and ruff a club. Now is the time to lead a low diamond from the table. (If you take another club ruff before playing a diamond, West will win the trick and play a club. East will be able to then ruff this with the jack, and the contract will fail.)

The defense can do no better than win the first diamond and play a second round of trumps, won by dummy’s ace. After a heart to the ace for a second club ruff, you will cash the diamond ace and ruff a diamond with the eight of spades.

Art this point, after drawing West’s last trump with the queen and discarding dummy’s diamond jack, dummy will have only top hearts left. You will have taken the three top trump, four hearts, the diamond and club aces, and three ruffs in one hand or the other, for a grand total of 12 tricks.

In today’s deal you reach four hearts, after preempting to two hearts at your first turn. When dummy comes down you observe that you have nine top tricks and require a 10th. There is a very simple plan that is essentially guaranteed to produce that critical extra trick. You should rise with the club ace and draw trump ending in hand, discarding the spade four from dummy if necessary. Then lead the spade three and cover West’s card as cheaply as possible.

Suppose the full deal is similar to the one set out here. East will win the spade 10 with the queen, but what can he do next? A spade return gives you the required trick immediately. The same is true if he exits with a club into dummy’s tenace. His best hope is to try either the diamond king or queen, which you will allow to hold. At that point, even a diamond continuation is fatal for the defense.

Note that you should duck the diamond honor, in case East has ingeniously shifted to an unsupported honor. If that were the case and you won the first diamond, West would get back on lead with a diamond and could now defeat the contract by reverting to clubs.

Note; it is indeed true that your partner might have done better to bid three no-trump instead of raising to four hearts. I’m sure he will think more seriously about stealing the contract the next time this situation arises, if you miss the winning play here.