This deal featuring Sally Brock caught my eye. Brock sat North in a team of eight event (two pairs sitting one way, two the other). Her four clubs was a splinter-bid agreeing hearts; her partner’s four diamonds was a mild slamtry (known as ‘Last Train’) rather than promising a diamond control. When her partner signed off in five hearts Brock knew he must have a spade control but he couldn’t have both top honors, so it was easy to bid the small slam. That was the par contract, but none of the other tables managed it.

Brock’s teammates with the North-South cards climbed to the grand slam. East doubled for no obvious reason, and West interpreted it as a Lightner double and made the unfortunate choice of the spade jack as his opening lead. That ended the defense, and led to a score of 2470.

One of Brock’s opponents also bid to the grand slam. Here, though, West led a quiet club king and the grand slam was one down.

Finally, at the fourth table, South passed as dealer and North opened one spade. South now made a splinter bid of four diamonds which encouraged North to use Blackwood (not the best choice with a void). That led to South making a five heart response, which West doubled for the lead. North now bid six spades and East duly led a heart, which West ruffed. Unsurprisingly, declarer now did not guess trumps, so six spades went down one, and Brock’s team got the maximum possible swing, of 24 IMPs.

Sometimes in bridge a perfectly reasonable bidding sequence can lead to the most horrible contract. But if the cards cooperate, miracles sometimes may happen. Today’s deal, from rubber bridge, is a case in point.

When partner had denied a four-card major there didn’t seem any point in bidding the spade suit, so North simply raised to three no-trump. After a heart lead, South may have thought that a concession of one down would be his best chance of avoiding too big a loss here. Remarkably, though, even after the heart lead he received, three no-trump is unbeatable.

South ducked the lead, won the heart continuation and unblocked the club ace. He then cashed the diamond ace. When the king came tumbling down, it didn’t help a great deal, but declarer tried a low spade from dummy, more in hope than expectation. East went in with the 10, but could do nothing other than exit with a low spade. Declarer won and played another spade and East was in again.

That player could cash his spades, so the defenders had four tricks now. But at that point East had to choose between giving dummy the rest with its diamonds, or leading a club and letting declarer take the rest with the help of his solid suit.

As an aside: though it looks normal enough to lead your long suit even when you have a weak hand, an initial spade lead by West would have beaten the contract. Now on accurate defense East-West must come to three spades, a heart and a diamond.

The three famous bridge players named Hackett, Paul and his sons Jason and Justin, have recently augmented to four. Barbara Stawowy, who has won World Championship Gold and Silver medals while playing for the German Women’s Team, is now married to Justin Hackett. Here, she is at work in the 2011 Women’s European Championships, held in Poznan, Poland.

As a note to the auction, North’s three diamond call showed 10-12 points, plus exactly three-card spade support. Hackett went straight to the spade game, and West led a heart. With possible losers in each black suit, declarer’s focus was to avoid a guess in the diamond suit.

She won the heart lead with dummy’s ace then led a low spade to her jack, finessing into the safe hand. West won with the queen and back came another heart, taken with the king in dummy, a diamond departing from South. After drawing the rest of the trump, ending in dummy, Hackett continued by taking her second black suit finesse, West capturing the club jack with the queen. But from that side of the table, no damage could be done, and eventually South could throw another diamond from the South hand on dummy’s fifth club. Just one further trick – a diamond – had to be lost.

Of course at double-dummy declarer can always do better, but only by endangering the contract against an unfavorable lie of the cards.

And just for the record, an argument could certainly be made for running the spade 10 from dummy at trick two.

At the Dyspeptics Club, when South heard East preempt in spades, his natural ebullience persuaded him that his partner would not contribute wasted values in that suit, so that six hearts would have decent play. Right he was, but that same optimism that had taken him to slam led to his misplaying his contract and suffering the consequences.

After the lead of the spade nine, South elected to win and draw trump ending in dummy. Then he played the non-preempter for the diamond queen, by cashing the king and finessing, and claimed he was unlucky when the missing queen turned up in the wrong place.

It often seems that North likes nothing better than to have a reason to criticize his partner, but on this occasion the intricacies of the play so occupied him that his analysis was delivered quite politely. What line of play do you think he suggested?

After drawing trump and ruffing out the spades, you find East with nine cards in the majors. Next play off the club ace and king. When East follows twice, cashing the diamond king and running the 10 is guaranteed to endplay East to give a ruff-sluff if he can win the trick. But if East turns up with a singleton club, he surely has 8=1=3=1 pattern. Cash both top diamonds and play a third, to endplay East in parallel fashion.

And if East turns up with a club void, then lead a diamond to the ace and finesse in diamonds with complete confidence, because West can have no more diamonds.

The surprise result of the 2011 European Open Championships was the capture of the Gold Medal in the Women’s Teams by the Turkish team. They beat a tough French squad in the semi-finals and a very distinguished Netherlands team in the finals.

This hand is from the finals of that event, demonstrating that preempting is a two-edged sword. In both rooms South opened one heart. Bep Vriend for the Netherlands had an uninterrupted passage to four hearts. West cashed the club ace and declarer ruffed the club continuation. With only a slight clue that anything might be amiss, Vriend made the natural play of the heart ace from hand, and that left her with two inevitable trump losers. Needing to set up spades, South tried a spade to the 10, and when this lost to the queen she could not avoid going one down.

In the second room West overcalled South’s one heart opener with three clubs. North bid four hearts, and the lead and continuation duplicated the action from the other table. On ruffing the second club, Dilek Yavas knew enough from the auction to start trump by leading a heart to the king, then continued with the spade jack, which held. A spade to the ace was followed by a third spade. East ruffed and returned the diamond ace, trumped in dummy. Now, using spades in the manner of a second trump suit, Yavas played on that suit, and East could come to just one further trick, the heart queen. Game made.

Iconoclasts will tell you rules are meant to be broken. Up to a point, perhaps. The reasons the rules exist is because they tend to have at least an underlying grain of sense. However, applying the rules without pausing for reflection is as dangerous as ignoring the rules altogether.

Let’s look at today’s deal, from a team game. What should West lead? In one room West settled for the low club lead, and declarer guessed extremely well to let it run, judging that West might well have been unhappy underleading a king here. East took his club king and shifted to spades, and the defenders took the ace and pressed on with that suit. Declarer pitched his spade loser on the clubs, and discarded his diamond loser on the club nine as West ruffed in. With the heart jack falling, declarer could claim the rest.

In the other room West was not put off by his awkward spade holding. South’s bidding suggested little outside a strong heart suit, so any missing spade honors were relatively likely to be in dummy, and spades was the most likely suit for East-West to have winners in, either to cash or to establish.

After the spade ace and another spade, declarer was locked in dummy. He elected to play a third spade, and West won and shifted to clubs, setting up his side’s fourth winner in plenty of time. Declarer finessed the queen, and East took his king and knew to shift to diamonds, to cash out for down one.

On this deal from the Mixed Teams at Sanya both Souths were faced with a choice of whether to go high or low at their first turn to speak. The fact that you have no sure defensive trick argues for preempting to the limit. Both Souths duly preempted to four diamonds and were raised to game. What should one lead from the West hand?

In one room West selected the club four. I’m not convinced about the technical merits of this approach — but it worked a treat. Declarer had no choice but to finesse, and East won with the king and returned the spade four, West’s major-suit aces producing a rapid one down.

In the second room, where Mike Cappelletti Jr. was declarer, West went for the heart ace. I admit it: this is what I would have done too. She then switched to an honest club nine, and declarer played her to be an upright citizen, and not to have the club king. He put up dummy’s ace and then treated the defenders to eight rounds of diamonds.

When the last of them hit the table, declarer had a club menace in hand and a threat card in each major. West had to keep two hearts and the spade ace, thus discarded her last club. With the communications cut between the two defenders, declarer could come down to two spades and one heart in dummy, and lead a spade toward the king for his 11th trick. That was a well-played +400 and 10 IMPs.

Benedicte Cronier and Sylvie Willard of France are generally ranked as one of the world’s top women pairs – and they are also charming partners and teammates.

In the most recent world championships where duplicated boards were in use Willard outplayed most of the declarers (male and female) in her seat.

She declared six clubs on a top diamond lead. She won in dummy and tried the club ace, believing her RHO’s play of the club queen. So she played the spade ace and ruffed a spade, crossed to the diamond king and ruffed another spade, (West missing her chance by following low at every turn). Then declarer tried two top hearts, and when East also fell from grace by failing to drop one of the heart jack or 10 under the king, Willard decided the suit was not breaking.

She ruffed her diamond winner to dummy, then judged perfectly to ruff a spade to hand and exit in hearts. This forced West to ruff and lead away from her trump trick. Plus 1370 meant Willard was the only declarer to make her slam in the McConnell Cup.

As indicated above, West could surely have made Willard’s life far harder by dropping the spade king on the third round of spades. Now declarer would surely have played for hearts to break, allowing West to ruff in while she could still exit with the fourth spade, defeating the slam.

Just for the record: at least two tables in the open event played partscore here with the NorthSouth cards, picking up a very undeserving swing.