An early card-play lesson given to beginners is "play the high honors from the short hand first, so as not to block the suit." So a novice might have looked askance at declarer's handling of this six-heart contract, on receipt of a club lead.

South could count on 11 tricks, and courtesy of his diamond holding, appreciated that his best chance of a 12th trick lay in the diamond suit, so long as the missing diamond honors were divided between the defenders; or if West held both the queen and jack.

But he saw another problem: the diamonds might become blocked, with the defenders switching to dislodge the spade ace before diamonds could be untangled. So, seeing the need to keep a late club entry in dummy, declarer won the lead in hand with the club ace. As the only other entries to hand were in trumps, South led the diamond 10 at trick two. East won with the queen and found the spade switch.

Winning in dummy, declarer proceeded to draw trump in four rounds, pitching a spade from North, then advanced the diamond nine. Hoping that East held the diamond eight, West covered with the jack. But on winning with the king, declarer was able to return to his diamond eight, play a club to dummy’s queen, then discard his losing spade on the diamond ace.

All that remained was for declarer to ruff a spade with his last trump and cash the club king for 12 tricks.

Today's deal comes from a recent match in the 2014 Grand National Teams heats, to determine which team would represent each district in the knockout teams at the Las Vegas nationals last August.

Both tables reached six spades on relatively blind auctions, and both Wests did well to lead diamonds, setting up a potential winner for their side if they could regain the lead.

Both declarers tackled trumps in predictably unsuccessful fashion by cashing the ace and king. When the trump loser came to light, the key to the deal was to dispose of the diamonds from the South hand on dummy’s club and heart winners.

One declarer followed the uninspired line of playing on hearts first, the suit he had far fewer cards in. West ruffed the third and cashed his diamond for down one. The second declarer recognized the point of the deal. He saw that he needed West to have at least three clubs, so he might as well play clubs before hearts — just in case the defender had his actual pattern of two hearts and four clubs. Had the clubs broken 3-3, South would then have tried to cash the three heart winners before the fourth club. As it was, when East showed out on the third club, it was safe to take the fourth club first, and only then to play on hearts. By the time West could ruff in, the second diamond had already been discarded.

These days the Jacoby two-no-trump response is a common way to set partner's major-suit as trump, and to find out whether opener has extra values, or extra trumps, or side-suit shortage. The situation is more complicated when the opponents butt in, though. Opener needs to be able to show shortage or control in the opponents' suit — or even to be able to penalize them for their temerity.

In today’s auction, when the opponents intervened over North’s Jacoby two-no-trump, South took the opportunity to show a second suit. North construed this as a decent five-card holding and did not have the mechanism available to check on the quality of the side-suit, so took a shot at the grand slam. Then it was up to South to justify his partner’s optimism.

The heart two was led and ruffed. Declarer cashed the spade ace, king, and queen. Now it would have been natural to assume that the overcaller was short in a specific side-suit, but South saw there was no rush to commit himself.

Next came the diamond ace and king, and a heart ruff to hand and a diamond ruff in dummy. This was the critical play, as it revealed that East had started with only a doubleton diamond, and thus precisely a 1-7-2-3 shape.

It was now an easy matter to cash the club king and then to finesse against East’s club queen. Note: that if declarer discards his diamond loser on the heart ace, he never finds out the critical piece of information.

Larry Cohen, of the "Law of Total Tricks" fame, publishes a free monthly newsletter on the internet, which is well worth checking out. That's where I found today's deal.

First, let’s start by taking the East hand. After two passes, South opens one diamond, and West overcalls with a weak two hearts. When North makes a negative double, it is over to you.

As partner has advertised at least six hearts and you have four, Cohen recommends that you bid four hearts — the level of the combined trump holding, putting maximum pressure on South.

Despite your best efforts, South bids four spades. Time to change seats — now you are South declaring that contract. West leads the heart king, won in dummy. What now? Diamonds need be set up before trumps are drawn. So lead a diamond to the ace and play another diamond to put East on lead.

Back comes a heart, and the crux of the hand has been reached. You need to ruff a diamond in dummy to set up that suit, and if you ruff this heart in hand, you will lose control against a 4-1 trump break. As there is an inevitable club loser, why not lose it now? Instead of ruffing, discard the club six.

A third heart can now be ruffed in dummy. Lead a club to hand for another diamond ruff high, draw trump, taking the 4-1 break in stride, and the South hand is now high.

This hand is from the world championships held in Bali last September, where Italy won the Bermuda Bowl, defeating China in the quarterfinals.

When Chuangcheng Ju declared three no-trump, Antonio Sementa led the diamond king. Dummy’s ace won, as East showed an even number of diamonds. At trick two West captured the club king with his ace.

West could see that cashing his diamonds would give South his ninth trick, so he shifted deviously to his low spade. When declarer finessed, the roof fell in. Giorgio Duboin took the trick and returned a diamond, letting Sementa cash out for down two.

In the other room East had responded two spades at his first turn — weak and natural. Again, the defenders led a top diamond, won the club ace, and shifted to a spade (this time the 10) at trick three.

Norberto Bocchi now knew to win the spade ace and run all his club winners. When the last club was played, East could discard a spade safely enough, and South could shed another diamond. But what was West to do? If he threw a heart, declarer would play the heart ace to drop the king. If he threw a diamond, declarer could play the spade jack and take two more tricks with the heart ace and spade queen. And if West threw his spade, declarer could exit with his diamond, end-playing West to cash his diamonds, but then to lead a heart away from his king at trick 12.

The Venice Cup is the world championships for women, and in Bali last year it was won by the Americans, who narrowly defeated the English in the final. Today's deal comes from England's victory in the semifinals against another of the world's powerhouse women's teams, the Chinese. In today's deal, though, the Chinese came off best, with Yan Li at the helm in a delicate no-trump game.

Susan Stockdale led the heart nine, to the two, 10 and queen. Things didn’t look that good for declarer, since a lot had to be done to be able to scramble nine tricks together.

At trick two Yan made the natural play of the diamond jack, which went to the king, ace and seven. Yan’s key play came at the next trick when she led a club to the nine and East’s jack.

Stockdale now shifted to a spade and Yan won the trick with her king. The club queen followed, and when that wasn’t covered and the 10 appeared from East, declarer was able to repeat the finesse in clubs. She ended up scoring one spade, two hearts and three tricks in each minor. This technique in the club suit is called an intra-finesse, and involves finessing against a doubleton honor, then pinning it on the next turn.

Incidentally, had West won the first club and returned the suit, declarer would have cashed her club and diamond winners, then endplayed West with the fourth diamond to lead spades for her.

In today's deal from the Bermuda Bowl semifinals in Bali, John Kranyak for USA-I declared four hearts. West led the spade queen and declarer won in dummy and played the club jack next. East took the ace, and instead of playing a spade to ensure the defeat of the contract, exited with the club two. Declarer ruffed and ran the heart jack to East's queen. The diamond return went to dummy's jack and declarer unblocked the heart ace, played a spade to the jack, followed by the heart 10. East won, but declarer could claime the balance — he had his 10 tricks.

In the other room Claudio Nunes took the spade lead, cashed the heart ace, then continued with a second round. East took the king and switched to a diamond. East was now threatening to underlead his clubs and get a diamond ruff. However, declarer won the diamond with dummy’s queen, played a spade to the jack, overtook the spade 10 with the king, and played the spade six, on which he discarded the club six from his hand – a classic example of the Scissors Coup. With the link to his partner cut off, East could now take only his master trump.

At double-dummy, though, an initial diamond lead defeats the contract. Declarer does best to win, cashes the major-suit aces, then continues with three more spades, throwing the club as before. East can win the spade and force declarer with clubs at every turn to establish a third trump trick.

Today's deal was played in three no-trump or in six diamonds at every table. Whatever contract was attempted came home in some comfort — since if North played three no-trump on a heart lead, he would take the spade finesse as his extra chance before going after the ninth trick that he needed from the club suit. Of course had he played on clubs before spades, he would have risked going down as the cards lay.

The play in six diamonds followed a curiously similar general pattern. West led a heart and declarer tried an early club to the king and ace. Now South knew he needed a discard from dummy to take care of the losing club, so he also led a spade to the jack. When the finesse succeeded, he had a straightforward route to 12 tricks.

Only one East-West pair went plus; here is how they did it (on the auction shown).

Mike Passell as West did very well to stay out of the auction. (Had he overcalled one heart, East would have shown a pre-emptive raise in that suit, and declarer would have known to take the spade finesse rather than play on clubs.)

Against six diamonds Passell selected the heart lead, which gave declarer nothing. Declarer, Jerzy Russyan, won the heart and led a club to his king, smoothly ducked by Passell, persuading declarer to draw trumps and lead a second club toward his hand. Down one!

In the quarter-finals of the world championships, the US and Canadian teams met up, in an elimination match. In a see-saw match, the US pulled away at the end, to win comfortably.

Both tables played four spades here, and ,against the Canadian declarer, Bobby Levin led the diamond king, ducked by declarer. A second diamond went to dummy’s ace, and Daniel Korbel pulled trumps in three rounds before taking the heart finesse. Now the club jack went to the eight, three and queen.

Korbel ruffed the diamond return, then played a low club from hand, Levin playing the ace. Had Korbel unblocked the club 10 from dummy, he would still have had a chance to make the contract. (He could guess to enter dummy with the heart ace and play a low club to his seven.) However, with the blocking club 10 still in dummy, declarer had no chance after ruffing the diamond return with his last trump. He cashed the club king and had to concede one down.

In the other room West also led the diamond king, ducked, and continued the suit. The American declarer, Kevin Bathurst, won and played the spade 10, then a spade to the jack, before judging very well to advance a low club from hand. West could do no better than win the club queen and cash the club ace before continuing with the diamond queen. The ruff-sluff allowed Bathurst to discard a low heart from hand and claim his 10 tricks.