In his team’s loss to the Monaco team at the Vanderbilt tournament last spring, Jeff Aker confronted his world champion opponent with an interesting problem. Have a look at the West cards, and see how you would have dealt with it?

Your low club lead goes to the eight and declarer’s queen. At trick two, the heart king appears on the table. Make a play, and a plan. Would you win or duck – and what will you do next?

At the table, West ducked the heart king, then won the next heart as East discarded the club jack. West next led a low club. Declarer ducked the trick, won the next club, then cashed the diamond ace and diamond queen, followed by the top two spades, and put West on lead with a heart.

At this point West could cash his heart and club winners, but then had to give dummy the lead. That meant nine tricks for declarer: three diamonds and two winners in each of the other suits.

The key to the defense is that West has to see the endplay looming. He must win the second heart and cash the heart ace before exiting in clubs. Then he cannot be subsequently endplayed in hearts. This is particularly hard to see, since it appears that you are building tricks for declarer, but if the diamond king is an entry to dummy you will not prevent declarer establishing the hearts.

Vlad Isporski (a regular player and also non-playing captain on the Bulgarian national team) spotted the winning line in five diamonds. Yes, three no-trump would have been far less dramatic, but who cares about efficiency when we can have the aesthetic delight of a squeeze?

Isporski told me that East had implied good values and a spade suit. In five diamonds, you get a spade lead and observe that if the diamond queen doesn’t fall you need something good to happen in hearts.

You win the spade ace, cash the club ace and club queen then lead a heart from dummy. East wins the heart queen and is endplayed. He has nothing better to do than exit with the spade king, and you ruff, cash the top diamonds (both follow but no queen appears) then lead a third club.

East must discard rather than ruff in. so you win the club king, cash the spade queen, and have now reached a four-card ending — three spades, one heart, two diamonds and three clubs having been played.

When you ruff the club seven in dummy, East is squeezed in three suits, one of which is trumps. If he overruffs, he can lead a heart and surrender his trick there, or play a spade for a ruff-sluff and let you discard your heart loser.

So East must discard, but pitching a heart will unguard his king, while letting a spade go allows him to be endplayed with a trump to lead hearts at trick 12.

On this deal from a regional knockout at the spring nationals at Dallas last year it might seem a little unfair to write up the only board on which Ishmael Del’Monte’s team lost IMPs. But it did feature outstanding play by the Australian star, who was South on the following deal.

Against six hearts West led the spade eight, suit preference for diamonds. Del’Monte won the spade ace and played a club to dummy’s ace, followed by a heart to the king. Then came a club ruff, the heart ace and heart queen. On the second and third round of trumps, East had to pitch first a diamond then his remaining spade to keep the club king and five diamonds. Now a diamond to the queen brought the bad news for declarer.

A further club ruff brought about a five-card ending where dummy had a losing spade and four diamonds, while declarer had a trump, diamond two losing clubs and a small spade. Since West was down to all spades, Del’Monte could safely exit in that suit. West won and had no choice but to return a spade now, squeezing his partner in the minors! Declarer could ruff and depending on West’s discard, either cash his clubs or take the winning diamonds in dummy.

Beautifully played, but why did Del’Monte’s team lose IMPs? At the other table, North played six hearts doubled on a diamond lead. West got his ruff but declarer claimed 12 tricks in a canter.

The problem with being given a play or defend hand is that you are automatically put on notice to bring your ‘A’ game. Well, you have been warned!

At the table, during the Dallas spring nationals, can you spot the best line to make the optimistic contract of six hearts after a diamond lead? Would you play a round of trumps or do something else?

Best is to ruff a diamond with the trump ace at once, then draw a round of trumps with the king. If they split, you will cash the spade ace, draw trumps in three rounds ending in dummy, and take the spade finesse.

But trumps are 4-0; West having four. So you lead a club to the queen, forcing an entry to dummy in that suit. You then ruff a second diamond with a high trump, draw trumps ending in dummy, and now run the spade jack. This ensures the contract against five-one spades when West has a small singleton.

As declarer discovered to his cost at the table, if you play to ruff a club in dummy you cannot draw all the trumps before playing on spades, and West can ruff in on the second spade. (And even if West was 2-4-5-2 he could discard his second spade on the third club).

For the record: if you play a heart to your hand at trick two the contract becomes unmakeable — and a low club opening lead beats the contract by force.

It’s hard to imagine not getting to three no-trump on this deal from the Dallas spring national tournament. Typically, after North had shown the red suits South got to play the no-trump game, leaving West an awkward opening lead. Let’s say he leads the heart seven. Declarer wins the heart queen, East encouraging, then plays a diamond to the queen, on which East if using the Smith Echo can play low to suggest that he is happy for his partner to make the obvious shift.

Now declarer leads a low spade from hand, and to defeat the contract, East must win the first or second spade and shift to the club queen – a play that was rarely found, although world champion Ricco van Prooijen of the Netherlands did exactly that.

But say West hops up with the spade ace at trick three to play another heart, forcing declarer to win and run his diamonds.

The last diamond forces West (who has one spade, two hearts and three clubs left) to reduce to five cards, and whatever he does is fatal. If he pitches his spade, he is endplayed with the heart ace and another heart to lead clubs for declarer. If West throws a heart, declarer can cash two heart tricks. And if West lets go of a club, declarer plays a spade, unblocking the queen when East wins the king. Now the defenders can only take two club tricks, whatever they or declarer do, so dummy takes a spade and a heart at the end.

At last year’s spring nationals in Dallas the Swiss Teams event threw up this technical problem, on what looks like everybody’s four spade contract. Incidentally, the auction featured a Texas Transfer. Yes, everything is bigger in Texas, but on this occasion North was playing a style where a transfer and raise to game would have been a mild slam-try.

The defenders lead a top club and shift to the heart jack — a normal if unchallenging defense. You win the queen, then play the spade ace and a second spade. West follows with the 10 then discards a club. How should you take it from there?

It looks natural to try to find West with the diamond queen, but this is not very much better than a 50% chance. If you misguess diamonds, (imagine the same layout as in the diagram but with the diamond queen and five switched) the defenders will clear hearts, and then East may be able to ruff the third diamond, to prevent you from getting the discard you need of dummy’s heart loser.

The solution is simple: cash the third top trump, to prevent accidents, then take the diamond king and lead towards the diamond ace. If East ruffs in, you have no diamond loser. If East follows suit, you win the diamond ace and play a third diamond. The defenders cannot stop you from winning the heart ace and pitching the heart on the remaining high diamond. Even though they can ruff in, the loser has gone away.

In today’s slam South saw at once that he was very well placed to make 12 tricks. All he needed was four spade tricks, so he intended to cash the spade queen and finesse the 10 as a safety play on the second round of the suit, protecting himself against a five-one spade break with West having the length.

Accordingly he won the opening lead in hand and took the spade queen and led a second spade toward dummy. When West discarded, it was time for a new plan.

South took the spade king, then played off the king and queen of clubs, followed by the king and queen of diamonds. East followed suit both times in each suit, so now South had to commit himself.

Since his combined holding in hearts was longer than in either minor, and West’s opening lead had suggested length there, South mentally crossed his fingers and took his remaining high heart, which had the effect of squeezing East into letting go something he did not want to part with. Not surprisingly he chose a small diamond, which seemed safe enough. But South now took the diamond ace, forcing East to pitch a club. That allowed South to play off dummy’s remaining club honor, reducing dummy and East down to just three spades each. At this point declarer led a low spade from the board, forcing East to win and lead into dummy’s spade tenace at trick 12.

When you reach the wrong strain, and at the wrong level, there is a special incentive to play it well, or partner will be more than usually unhappy.

It was remarkably unlucky that six diamonds was not a claim – but there again, in a perfect world North-South would have played in seven hearts.

At the table South won the opening lead, discarding a spade on the club ace, and led to the diamond jack to get the bad news. Undaunted, he ran the spade queen, East ducking his king, and then played three more rounds of trumps, leaving West with the high trump.

Now declarer went after hearts, but it was easy for West to delay ruffing in until the fourth round of the suit (if he mistimes his ruff, declarer will get his spade away, either sooner or later). Then he exited with a club, and South had a spade loser at the end.

To make the slam legitimately, South must ruff the opening lead in hand and cross to the diamond jack. Then he runs the spade queen and draws three more rounds of trumps, discarding a club from the table. Next he cashes the spade ace, discarding dummy’s last small club, and starts on the hearts. Whenever West ruffs, he must return a club and dummy will be high. Declarer knows West has no more than two spades, since he has five trump and at least six clubs. So he will not have a spade left to lead when he ruffs in.