Today’s deal comes to me in the form of an ethical question. What should you do if you believe partner has forgotten the system?

Declarer, a top professional was using a complex system of transfers after the one no-trump response, but was aware that her partner did not know it as well as she would have liked. The deal came up in a club duplicate, with North’s two spade call a transfer to clubs!

South correctly alerted it, but was fairly sure that her partner had forgotten. She felt her hand was so suitable for a club slam that she could not ethically try to get back to spades – even though they were playing matchpoints. After she raised clubs, she landed in what she fully expected to be an unappetizing spot.

When West led the diamond ace and switched to a heart, South won the ace, ruffed a diamond and ran the heart queen. When it held, she played a club to the 10, a club to the ace and took another ruffing heart finesse. West covered, so declarer ruffed, trumped a diamond, and all West could make was his trump trick.

South opened the travelling score slip with little confidence, but to her surprise the rest of the field were making just nine tricks in spade games or partscores. The hand doesn’t play so well in spades by North. After a club lead and continuation, the defenders will surely come to four tricks whatever declarer tries. A trump lead will also leave declarer with an impossible task.

When this deal came up at a European Junior championships, Evgeni Rudakov of the Russian Junior team was apparently the only declarer who played today’s three no-trump contract correctly when confronted with the problem.

Rudakov declared three notrump as South on the lead of the two of hearts. He correctly took the ace immediately for fear of a diamond switch. Now how should you tackle the club suit?

One possible approach is to run the club eight. This works if West has a small singleton club, but loses to both a singleton jack or 10. Rudakov tried a different approach when he led the club eight from dummy, and when East followed small unconcernedly, he put up the queen.

Several other declarers did something similar, but on seeing the fall of the 10, they simply cashed the club ace next and could not recover. However, there is a way to ensure five club winners, and that is the number required to guarantee the contract.

Rudakov played the spade four to dummy’s queen at trick three, then led the remaining club from dummy. When East correctly played low, declarer overtook with the nine. Now two more rounds of the suit gave him nine tricks – five clubs, two spades and two red aces. Had the club nine lost to the 10, it would have meant that the suit had broken evenly, of course, and he would still have had nine tricks.

Note that if declarer takes the king and ace of spades before playing on clubs, he cuts himself off from the long clubs.

Today’s deal from a Polish teams tournament saw South miss his chance to draw the correct inference from the auction. He might have put himself in line for a brilliancy prize, but had to content himself with the consolation prize of nursing a beer in the bar while uttering the Polish equivalent of “I could have been a contender.”

When East opened two spades, which in his methods guaranteed precisely five spades and four or more cards in one of the minors, South had no convenient way to describe his assets. He opted for an agricultural leap to five diamonds, and the defenders led a spade and shifted to hearts.

Declarer won in hand, and was all set to claim 12 tricks. He cashed one top diamond and was hugely taken aback when it was West who discarded. The best he could do now was tempt East by advancing the diamond jack. When East rejected the Greek gift, declarer had no option but to run his trump, and concede two heart tricks in the ending, when the defenders made no mistake.

Can you see somewhat abstruse play that declarer might have found? He must unblock a spade honor at trick one. This gives up on the overtrick in most cases, but here it is essential. You win the heart shift, and cash one top trump. When the bad break comes to light, cash the remaining top spade then duck a spade to East, who cannot afford to duck dummy’s seven, and must now lead a trump, spade or club, all of which are fatal.

When the defenders lead a low spade against three no-trump, you must put up the jack. It will do you no good to play low from dummy and force an honor, since dummy’s remaining spade honor is bare. With three spades in dummy instead of two, the percentage action at trick one would be to play low, hoping West had led from honor-10 fourth or fifth of spades.

When the spade jack is covered, you duck and win the next spade, West playing the spade two to indicate an initial five-card suit. Now how do you combine the club and heart chances?

With the heart nine in hand instead of the seven, you would cash the heart ace then the club aceking. If the club queen had not fallen, you would lead the heart 10, intending to run it. (It is marginally better to take the top clubs as opposed to the top hearts, since the chance of a doubleton club queen exceeds that of a doubleton heart queen). However, you cannot follow this line here, since you might still go down if the heart queen was onside but the suit did not break 3-3.

Your best way to augment your chance of the club finesse is to take the club ace, then the heart ace, unblocking dummy’s eight, and the heart king unblocking dummy’s 10 when West follows with the heart queen. You can then cash the diamond aceking and finesse the heart seven, to make nine tricks. If the hearts did not behave, you would run the club nine, of course.

Today’s deal came up in a duplicate pair game. East decided that his balanced hand with weak trump and soft cards on the side meant that he was far better suited for a simple spade raise rather than a preemptive raise. The only alternative to the preemptive raise would have been a mixed raise – and that requires a little extra side-suit shape — and maybe the spade queen instead of the two.

East was correct that his side should be defending not declaring, but he undid all his good work immediately. When South declared four hearts on a top diamond lead, the 10 going to the queen, king and ace, he played off his two top trumps, then took three rounds of clubs, ruffing the third in hand. He next crossed to the diamond jack, and pitched a loser on the fourth club as East ruffed in. There were still two black-suit losers to come, but the contract was secure.

Can you see where the defensive mistake came? At trick one, East’s decision to cover the diamond queen was an error. Had he ducked the diamond, there would have been no delayed entry to dummy in a side-suit. Now no matter what declarer does, he cannot reach the established clubs, and he will be left with three plain losers and a trump loser.

For the record, on a different day, if West did not have the diamond eight, and East had the spade entry, covering the first diamond might be the only way to avoid a later endplay. But not today.

Bridge seems to make more of a splash in Scandinavia than in the US. One of the leading Copenhagen newspapers, Politiken, devoted two full pages to a tournament played there. Of course, it may not have been entirely irrelevant that they were the sponsors…

The late Omar Sharif in partnership with Jose Damiani (ExPresident of the World Bridge Federation) was pleasantly surprised to find that their simple auction of Pass – one no-trump; three no-trump (with at least nine top winners) earned a top score. The partnership did not have a weak two-diamond opening in their arsenal, and Sharif deemed his hand not worthy of a one-level opener. I’m not sure I agree, but never mind.

The rest of the room played in diamonds, some even climbing to a hopeless slam. Indeed, only one declarer made as many as 11 tricks. But how would you tackle five diamonds after a spade lead? Presumably, after drawing trump, you would play on hearts, but nothing quite works when, after taking their first heart trick, the defenders switch to clubs.

The successful South had the benefit of a lead-directing double by East of a club bid made by North. Ignoring his partner’s suggestion, West still led a spade. After cashing the second spade winner and drawing trump, a low club was led from dummy. East took his 10 and returned the club king but, but after winning on the table, declarer led the club jack and discarded a heart. Bingo! East was end-played.

Omar will be a great loss to the game he loved so much.

The Dyspeptics Club is a place where the kibitzers come as much for the post mortem as they do to watch the bridge. Zero Tolerance is not part of the club’s bylaws, and while the members draw the line at physical violence, verbal outrages are considered the norm, and some would say, positively encouraged.

In today’s deal South played four hearts by winning the top spade lead in hand, drawing trump, then playing the club ace, king and a third club. West had supinely failed to unblock his club queen on the second round of the suit, so he was forced to give the lead to dummy and declarer had 10 tricks.

As South waited for applause from his partner, and East gnashed his teeth at his partner’s incompetence, North wryly remarked that if South was half as good as he thought he was, he would still be twice as good as he actually was. Why was he unhappy with his partner?

Declarer must duck the spade queen; he wins the next one with the ace, cashes the club ace and king, throws a club on the spade king, then ruffs the clubs good. Next he draws three rounds of trump ending in dummy, so that he can cash the established club as his 10th trick.

Incidentally, if West has a 3-3-5-2 shape with all the high diamond honors, declarer might still succeed. He strips off all West’s black cards and after drawing trump leads a low diamond to endplay West to lead diamonds round to the king.

Most of the hands provided to the ACBL bulletins congratulate someone on their good play; it takes a very modest player to report their own errors, in the hope of helping others. Mary Oshlag brought this hand in with her tip — I will give it to you at the end of the hand.

Slam is no bargain here. Since Mary had upvalued her strong no-trump into an acceptance of the quantitative four no-trump call, having already shown decent clubs at her second turn) she would have no-one to blame but herself if she failed.

How would you play the slam on a low diamond lead? Mary played low from dummy, and took the queen with her ace. She crossed to dummy with a spade and played a heart towards her hand. East hopped up with the ace and played a trump, and Mary drew two further rounds finishing in hand, but no longer had a winning line.

If she threw one of dummy’s diamonds on the heart king she would eventually lose a spade. Equally, if she discarded dummy’s spade on the heart king, the entry problem would prevent her from taking two diamond finesses after drawing trump.

More contracts are defeated by a trick-one error than from any other mistake. As Mary realized, if she had initially unblocked a diamond intermediate from table, she could have drawn trump, and pitched North’s spade loser on the heart king. Then she could have run the diamond eight and repeated the diamond finesse.

Determining which order to cash your winners is often critical, for a number of reasons. The lie of the cards in one suit may dictate the play in another, or you may need to take advantage of a favorable lie of the cards in order to avoid giving up the lead or taking a dangerous finesse. That concept applies nicely to today’s deal.

When you play three no-trump on the lead of the club six you duck in dummy. East wins the jack and returns the eight, West helpfully following with the four, which tells you the suit started out 5-3. If you surrender the lead, the defenders will cash out for at least down one.

Your best combination of plays to come to nine tricks is to unblock the top spades, then cross to the diamond king and play the spade queen. If the jack does not appear, put all your eggs in one basket by taking the diamond finesse. If the finesse works, you will be home unless the suit breaks 4-1, when you will also need the heart finesse.

But if the jack pops up, as here, you cash the fourth spade, then lead a diamond to the ace. Now you get to combine the chances of finding the diamond queen doubleton or falling back on the heart finesse. Since the diamond queen will fall in two rounds nearly one third of the time, you will make whenever that happens, plus half the rest of the time – a two-thirds chance. The straight diamond finesse is of course a 50-50 chance.