Today's deal from last year's NEC tournament comes from Hinden's successful semi-final match against an Australasian team.

Francis Hinden’s one spade call would surely be a unanimous choice here as South. This argues that since game is nothing special here, maybe the North hand is worth nothing more than a strong invitation?

Be that as it may, Hinden was forced to play four spades on a heart lead, and when she put up the queen, the hand was over. East covered the queen with the king and declarer could scramble two club ruffs in her hand while drawing trumps, but had to lose four red tricks at the end.

Better is to win the first heart in hand while preserving dummy’s queen. Then you can take the club finesse, cash the club ace, ruff a club, cross to the spade king, ruff a second club and take the two master trumps.

In the five-card ending the key is now whether to play West to have opened so light, or for South to have responded one heart with only a four-count. If you can read the location of the high cards, you can succeed now by leading the low diamond from dummy. If East ducks, he will eventually be endplayed with the second diamond to lead hearts. If he rises with the ace, declarer builds his game-going trick either from dummy’s heart or her own diamonds.

At last year's NEC tournament In the round six encounter between Down Under and Hinden both pairs had an opportunity to show off their skills.

Had Graham Osborne opened a weak two spade bid he might have gone quietly plus in that spot. But he opened one spade, and Francis Hinden was obliged to make a try for game. Of course two no-trump was a considerably more testing spot than two spades would have been, after Peter Newell’s lead of the diamond nine. After this lead, Hinden made the first nice play of the deal when she put up the diamond queen from dummy. If West ducks that, Hinden’s plan would have been to unblock the heart suit then play a second diamond toward her king and come home with eight tricks.

Martin Reid therefore won the diamond ace and responded to declarer’s coup with one of his own. He played back the diamond jack at trick two, forcing declarer to win the diamond in her hand, and cutting her off from the heart suit. From that point on declarer had only six winners.

This was a much admired play in the reports of the time. But note that if the spade 10 and two were reversed, declarer would have been able to succeed. She could have won the diamond, unblocked the heart jack, then cashed the club ace and played a spade towards her 10.

So perhaps winning the diamond and playing the club jack at trick two might have covered all the bases equally efficiently?

Today's deal determined who would take the vital eighth qualifying spot in the NEC tournament last year and advance to the knock-out phase.

In one room where declarer was part of a Dutch-Russian team the opening lead of the heart ace did not paralyze declarer, and South made 11 tricks in a canter.

In our featured room clubs were an unbid suit, so Bas Drijver led one, and the defense played two rounds of clubs. Declarer elected to draw a couple of rounds of trump and take a diamond finesse, allowing the defenders to take the club ruff, which left declarer with just nine tricks, and no qualifying place.

Declarer should have come home by simply taking the diamond finesse at trick three. Although the defenders can take a ruff, you get to ruff a diamond low and a diamond high when the suit breaks 4-3 long on your right. When the outstanding trumps are 2-2 you can now draw them all without loss.

Declarer still had a chance after drawing two rounds of trumps. Instead of playing diamonds, cash the two clubs — if West ruffs he will be endplayed. But if he doesn’t ruff what does he discard? If he pitches two hearts you play to ruff a diamond in hand. If he pitches a heart and a diamond to stop threaten an overruff, take the diamond finesse, ruff the heart return, then draw the last trump. When you cash the diamond ace, dummy’s diamond 7-4 will be worth a trick against East’s 9-3!

In today's deal from the NEC tournament last year both Wests led their doubleton diamond against four spades. Both declarers pitched three club losers as West ruffed, then exited with the spade jack. Here the two lines of play diverged slightly.

In both rooms South won, and here the paths changed. One declarer led out the second top spade, and when the queen did not drop he played the heart king to try to arrange a heart ruff in dummy. The other declarer tried the more subtle approach of leading the spade eight from hand first, but East ducked, to deny declarer an entry to dummy with the spade nine. After that trick, declarer also played the heart king to arrange a ruff in dummy, but he too was unable to take more than nine tricks.

At a third table Sue Picus found the way to come to 10 tricks. She too won the diamond lead in dummy and continued with top diamonds, pitching her clubs, as West ruffed the third round and tried the club ace.

Picus ruffed and got out with a heart. West won the heart and continued clubs, so Picus ruffed again, and cashed the spade ace, deciding from the fall of the jack to play West for no more spades. She ruffed a heart, cashed the diamond jack, pitching a heart, then continued diamonds. East could ruff in whenever he wished, but Picus could overruff and ruff another heart in dummy for her 10th trick.

All the deals this week comes from last year's NEC tournament in Yokohama. In three clubs Willie Whittaker received repeated spade leads, and ruffed, then unblocked the diamond king and led a heart to the queen and ace. Back came a heart, after which declarer can succeed by cashing his winners, taking a trump finesse, then ruffing two diamonds in dummy to score the ace-queen of clubs and four red-suit winners, plus three ruffs. Instead Whittaker played to ruff a diamond before cashing the second heart trick and that let West get a heart away. Better defense for West would have been to lead the third top spade when in with the heart ace, which promotes an additional trump winner and ensures the defeat of the contract.

In the other room the contract of three diamonds looked more playable; but again, if the defenders play three top spades early on, it may let East discard a heart loser.

In fact, though, after a top spade lead West shifted to trumps. Declarer voluntarily ruffed a spade to hand, and that let West subsequently play a third spade without setting up dummy’s jack. Declarer subsequently misjudged the play to go down two.

By contrast, when Ashley Bach for team Lorentz played three diamonds, he ruffed the spade at trick two and led the heart queen to the ace. He won the trump return, crossed to the heart jack and played three rounds of trumps. East could take two trump tricks but then had to lead a heart or club, allowing declarer to test both suits, and come home with nine tricks.

All the deals this week come from the NEC tournament held last year in Japan. The tournament is one of the strongest of the invitation teams event in the world, but also includes a large number of local Japanese teams.

In today’s deal, which was duplicated and played all round the room, it was common to play three no-trump from the North seat and to make it on a heart lead. With the diamond king-queen onside, declarer could eventually establish an extra trick in each minor.

By contrast, in Shanghai Financial versus China Shanghai both Wests (who had opened one spade playing a strong club system) led a top diamond against three no-trumps. Both Souths won the diamond lead, but there the paths diverged. The trusting declarer went after clubs, and the defenders cleared diamonds, letting East cash out when he got in with his surprise heart queen.

By contrast, the suspicious declarer, Liu Ning, found a very neat alternative after winning the diamond ace. He cashed one top spade and led the heart 10. East won and played back a diamond. West won his king, on which declarer unblocked dummy’s jack, then cleared diamonds, but declarer won the third diamond in hand and ran the spade 10. Now he cashed North’s top spades, then crossed to the heart jack, took the long spade, and ran the hearts for nine tricks.

The defense could still have prevailed in unlikely fashion had West simply covered South’s diamond at trick three. That deprives declarer of a critical entry to his hand.

In today's deal, from a knock-out at a regional tournament, the defenders at one table had no idea of the missed opportunity until it came to the scoring up. What happened at the table where the successful declarer was situated was that a strong club opening led South to declare three no-trump after showing his hearts. The defenders led the diamond queen, ducked round to the king, whereupon declarer claimed his nine tricks and moved on.

In the other room North-South had also done well to avoid playing the hopeless four heart contract. On the action shown, where South had promised a good 17-19 and a balanced hand, West led the diamond queen and East paused for refection before playing to trick one.

With West having no more than a six-count, three of the points being in diamonds, the defenders could surely take no more than four tricks if they ducked the first trick, or won it and pressed on with diamonds.

East could see declarer’s quick tricks looming, so desperate measures were surely called for – and that meant finding his partner with the spade king. To cover all the bases East won the diamond ace and shifted to a subtle spade queen. When the eight appeared from South West woke up to the significance of his blocking spade nine. He worked out to signal with it on the first spade, whereupon a low spade to the king saw West play a third spade, and the defenders could now take the first five tricks.

In today's deal the route to 12 tricks required some very careful manipulation of the trump spots to manage the entry position to best effect.

Against six hearts, reached after a somewhat optimistic final call by South, West led the spade king to South’s ace. Declarer realized he would need to try to establish dummy’s diamonds to get close to his slam. So he cashed the diamond ace then led a careful heart eight to dummy’s jack, gaining a bonus when the nine dropped, as now there was a firm third entry to dummy even if trumps failed to break 2-2. Next came the diamond queen. The idea was, that so long as the missing diamond honors were split between the defenders, or East held both the king and jack, South would be able to jettison his black suit losers. When East played low, South’s losing spade departed. West won and returned a spade, more in hope than expectation.

Declarer ruffed the spade return with a top trump, then returned to dummy by overtaking the trump seven with the 10. Now South called for the diamond 10, on which he discarded a club. The diamond nine, covered with the jack, was once again ruffed high. Finally, the heart four was overtaken with the six and the diamond eight provided a parking spot for South’s second club loser.

And for all you double-dummy analysts, a trump lead would beat the slam; maybe West might have considered it?