I first saw today’s deal a couple of years ago featured in a column on defensive strategy. The author referred to it as having cropped up in a league match – a maneuver which I sometimes rather untrustingly suspect is shorthand for having invented a convincing deal and rubbed it in dirt to create a more plausible patina.

Be that as it may, consider what took place when both tables reached six no-trump, perhaps after South had upgraded his 19-count with little justification into a two no-trump opener.

At one table South won the lead of the heart six, which went to the 10 and his ace, then led a club to dummy’s queen. When it held, he played a second club, and West won and pressed on with hearts, in an attempt to cut declarer’s communications for later pressure. This effort was unsuccessful. Declarer won the heart king and ran all his spade and club winners, reducing dummy to four diamonds while he had his three diamonds and the heart nine in hand. East had to discard his remaining heart honor to preserve his diamond stopper, and declarer cashed his heart nine for the 12th trick.

Nicely played, but in the other room after a similar opening lead West found the killing defensive maneuver when he ducked the second round of clubs. Declarer could not lead a third round of the suit, so he had little option but to fall back on the diamond break for his 12th trick, and when the suit refused to behave, he had to concede down one.

Today’s deal from the Dyspeptics Club saw a more polite post mortem than usual, after South had reached six diamonds following a typically exuberant auction. He ruffed the opening spade lead, drew trump in four rounds, and relied on clubs to break. When they did not do so, he went down like a stone, and apologized to his partner with the line that everything was wrong. However he avoided fanning the flames by asserting that there was nothing he could do; instead he asked an abnormally pensive North what he might have done differently.

Somewhat mollified, North pointed out that South could have guarded against a four-one break in clubs. Best is to cash only one top club at the second trick. Then dummy is entered with a trump to lead the second club towards the South hand.

East cannot defeat the contract by ruffing, for then South will play low. With the clubs now established, declarer can draw trump and eventually take the heart finesse for his contract. East’s best course is to discard, hoping that South’s clubs are headed by A-K-J. Then South would win the club king and could ruff one club in dummy. However, since the suit would not yet be established, the contract would be defeated.

As the cards actually lie, East’s refusal to ruff might cost him an overtrick, but that is clearly an affordable investment. When East discards, South can win with the club king, ruff a low club with dummy’s high trump, and draw trump. The heart finesse would represent 13 tricks if declarer dares to take it.

The final contract in today’s deal was six hearts by South – rather ambitious you might say, given the two missing keycards, not to mention the further hurdle of the bad club break.

When South heard his partner show heart fit with short spades, he decided to use Blackwood – far from unreasonably. Now North thought he had to catch up to show his void, though it might have been more discreet simply to answer the question his partner had asked.

East might have made a Lightner double of six hearts for the club lead, but he was not sure where his side’s second trick was going to come from. When he passed, West looked no further than his spade sequence on opening lead. South was unimpressed by the dummy, but that did not stop him giving the contract his best shot. He ruffed the opening lead, ostentatiously dropping his spade ace as he did so, took a heart finesse, then ruffed the spade king and repeated the heart finesse.

After drawing the last trump South was confident that his diamond loser was about to go on the clubs, but the 4-0 club break brought him back to earth.

Still, South did not give up; he cashed his remaining trumps, reducing down to the spade queen and three clubs, plus the diamond jack. West had to keep his diamond ace and three clubs so could similarly keep only one spade. With dummy down to two diamonds and three clubs, South cashed his spade queen and exited in diamonds, and West had to win and concede the rest.

Many of Mike Lawrence’s books on play and defense would surely rank amongst the best ever written on bridge. He has recently written “Tips on bidding” and “Tips on competitive bidding’, but today’s deal comes from the third, “Tips on Cardplay.”

The correct defense to four hearts starts with the lead of the spade king, on which East plays the queen. The queen here shows the jack and tells West that he can underlead the ace if he wishes. It is not, repeat, not, a suit preference signal. West does want to put East in, so he leads a spade to East’s jack. If East leads a diamond now, West will score a diamond trick along with the club ace, to set the game.

But how East should know to return a diamond and not a club? Answer: West will tell East which suit to shift to by leading a suit preference card at the second trick. If West wants a club return, he will lead the spade two. If West wants a diamond return, he will continue with the spade nine, as here. So East should finds the killing diamond switch at trick three.

Why is the play to the second trick suit preference, but not at trick one? A tough question, but in essence, on the first play in any suit if continuation makes sense, the basic signal is first attitude, then count if attitude is already defined. However, where your holding is precisely defined and you have a choice of winners or losers to play on subsequent tricks, that is where suit preference kicks in.

Even the most far-sighted of defenders can’t see one another’s hands, but they can often show precisely what they have, so long as they put together a sensible suite of agreements.

A sound agreement is that if you lead an anti-system high honor – should your normal style be to lead the king from A-K-x, then if you lead the ace and follow with the king — it shows the bare ace-king. Equally, if you lead the ace from ace-king, then switch to another suit, that promises a singleton.

This agreement is critical to defeating three hearts here, which looks a solid enough contract – the only worrying feature being possible ruffs for defense.

This pair of defenders were playing king from ace-king, so when West led the diamond ace East was immediately alerted to the possibility of there being a possible ruff for the defenders in either diamonds or spades.

Declarer’s concerns were soon realized when, at trick two, West switched to the spade three. East won with the ace, and although South tried to muddy the waters by following with the five, concealing the deuce, East was not fooled. West would have cashed both his diamonds if he had a doubleton, so his short suit had to be spades.

He returned his lowest spade, the four, suit preference for clubs. West ruffed, and trusting his partner’s signal, underled his club king. East won with the ace and returned another spade. West’s second ruff saw the contract drift one down.

Of course if West tries to cash a second diamond, declarer waltzes home with 10 tricks.

The original journalist who reported this deal was Dick Cummings of Australia.

He focused on it as a beautiful defensive hand, but there may be an even more subtle point in the play for declarer.

At the table, South was at the helm in four spades. The opening lead was the heart nine to the 10, followed by the heart ace. Since East had a choice of high hearts to lead, his selection of the very largest was designed to suggest a preference for the higher of the unbid suits, namely he liked diamonds more than clubs.

South ruffed the second heart with the spade jack, and West made the second thoughtful play for the defense when he discarded. Rather than cross to dummy to tackle trumps from the board, declarer concealed the position in the minors by playing the trump ace, followed by the 10. West won his spade queen, and switched accurately to a diamond. Now a third heart by East forced declarer to ruff with his last intermediate spade, which promoted the trump eight to the setting trick.

Very nicely defended but both South at the table and Cummings in his report had missed the point that declarer should have discarded a diamond at trick two.

This play is extremely unlikely to cost a trick, but it has the effect of cutting communications between the defenders’ hands. When West wins the spade queen, he can no longer reach his partner for the play of the third heart.

There are some hands where it may be better to be in a grand slam, or a safe game, than in a small slam. This might apply on a hand where the defenders establish a winner at once, and declarer needs a finesse to make either 11 or 13 tricks. Today’s deal has something in common with that idea, but South missed the point, and it proved fatal to his slam.

Most North-South pairs stopped at three no-trump here, but one pair imaginatively ventured into six hearts. West led the diamond queen, and declarer won and crossed to the heart 10. He took the spade finesse successfully, cashed the spade ace and ruffed a spade on the table. There were not enough entries to hand to ruff the last spade and draw trump, so South followed with three rounds of trump. East discarded two diamonds, and the 4-2 club break left South a trick short.

While the spade finesse was necessary (since five club tricks, four trumps and two aces adds up only to 11 tricks) South’s line of play stood to yield either 11 or 13 tricks, never 12.

To give himself the chance of some added pressure if the clubs do not break, South must duck the opening lead, to correct the timing for a squeeze. West can do no better than lead a second top diamond. Now declarer finesses in spades, cashes the ace and ruffs a spade, then runs the trump. On the fourth heart, East has to unguard either spades or clubs, and declarer has the rest.

Even at favorable vulnerability I’d require a better hand than South’s on which to overcall at the two level. However, South can catch up at his next turn and reach a sensible game.

Against four hearts East wins the first trick with the spade queen and returns a low trump; plan the play. It is clear that East has three black winners, and he must be expecting to win those tricks. Given that West is clearly short in spades, why isn’t East trying to find that setting trick in the form of a trump, by cashing his three black suit winners and then leading a third spade, hoping that West can ruff higher than the dummy? Such a plan would work if West had any trump honor.

Assuming that East is a competent player, there can be only one reason for his failure to try this plan: East knows that it cannot possibly work. East must hold the heart queen-jack himself, and he therefore knows that his partner probably cannot over-ruff the dummy.

If East had led three rounds of spades, his partner would have had to make it obvious to you that East had the heart queen-jack. Now South would be warned that two trump finesse were necessary to pick up the suit.

So East is leading trump to force South to make up his mind before all of the facts are in. However, South must realize why East is avoiding the obvious defense, and therefore South must play low from hand and run the lead to dummy’s 10.

When South opens one notrump, North can see that his side’s combined count is not enough to think seriously about a slam. He might have come to a different conclusion without his values in the short suits, but as it is, he should be satisfied to settle for the no-trump game.

After the initial spade lead, the fact that South has a doubleton spade in each hand means he can only count on winning two spades and four clubs. Hence, he needs to develop three tricks in the red suits.

The diamonds should provide the necessary tricks, unless East has four or more diamonds headed by the A-10. There is no danger if West has such a diamond holding, since South will eventually be able to finesse in the suit, using dummy’s diamond nine.

To guard against all the dangerous diamond breaks — except the bare ace with West — South must lead diamonds from the dummy. East ducks, since playing the ace would permit South to preserve his king and jack. South wins the first diamond with the king and can then return to dummy to lead another diamond.

Once again, (as the cards lie) East must play low, and South wins with the jack. West’s discard reveals the bad break, and South now knows that he cannot develop the diamonds in time to make the contract.

However, he can now switch his attention to hearts, and by leading that suit, he will come to his ninth trick — just in time.