There was an element of Ping-Pong in today's deal, which cropped up in the later stages of a recent U.S. Teams Trials.

South’s two-club bid on the second round was a relay, setting up a forcing sequence. When South emphasized his spades rather than introducing his clubs, the second-best slam was reached. Six spades is not a hopeless spot, but it looks doomed because of the 6-2 heart break.

However, when West led the club jack, declarer won in dummy with the king. He then cashed the spade ace and king before leading a diamond from the dummy. East went in with the ace (perhaps expecting that West would have led a diamond from his actual holding) and declarer ruffed.

Now declarer had 12 tricks; but when he crossed to dummy’s heart king and played the diamond king, he did not yet know that clubs were breaking. So he discarded a club from his hand. Now when his attempt to ruff a heart in dummy was overruffed, he had to go one down.

Do you see where declarer went wrong? It was an error to play the diamond king when he did; he should have played the club ace first. If both opponents follow, he draws the last trump and concedes a club, later crossing to dummy with a club to discard a heart on the diamond king. However, if someone shows out on the club, he plays the heart ace and ruffs a heart before pitching a club on the diamond king.

Staying in control of dummy's entries would have been the key to success on today's deal. North correctly did not introduce his diamond suit at his first turn, and saw no reason to look any further than the no-trump slam when South showed a balanced hand.

Against six no-trump, West led the club 10, and declarer appreciated that he needed to bring in the diamond suit to make the slam. Of course, had dummy’s redundant spade jack been the diamond jack, the slam would have been foolproof.

South won the club lead with dummy’s king, then led a low diamond to his king. Returning to dummy in hearts, declarer played a second diamond. East smartly rose with the ace to return a heart, taking out dummy’s last entry. Although the diamonds could be set up after the queen dropped the jack, declarer needed a helicopter to reach the rest of the suit. One more option remained — the heart king might have dropped the jack — but when that failed, so did the slam.

South had allowed East to disrupt dummy’s entries. See the difference if declarer wins the first club in hand. Next comes a heart to dummy, for a diamond to the king. When that holds, a second heart to dummy is followed by another diamond, and now East is helpless. If he rises with the ace and returns a club, declarer wins in hand, cashes the diamond queen, collecting the jack, then a club to dummy’s king reunites him with the rest of the diamond suit.

Today's deal comes from last year's world junior championships, featuring interesting problems in both rooms from the match between England and China. In the first room West opened one diamond and North made a light takeout double. East raised to two diamonds and South doubled for takeout. When North bid three clubs, South continued with three spades, and North raised to game. This was a poor contract, which duly went one down on a diamond lead.

In the other room, West also opened one diamond, but here the English pair handled the bidding better, and Tom Paske (South) became declarer in three no-trump on the auction shown.

On a diamond lead, declarer put up dummy’s jack and East covered with the queen. Declarer ducked the first diamond and won the next round, the opponents’ carding suggesting that diamonds were 4-4. Given East’s silence in the auction, declarer laid down the club ace, and when the jack dropped, he could drive out the king and later take the spade finesse. Three spades, three clubs, two hearts and one diamond added up to nine tricks and 12 IMPs to England.

In isolation, the right play in clubs for three tricks is to take two finesses, but in light of the bidding, South’s play was clearly right since West had opened the bidding and East had already shown up with the diamond queen. With only 15 points missing, it was almost certain that West had the club king.

In this deal from the Yeh Bros. there were two leads to trouble South's three no-trump. Tony Nunn of Australia led a top spade against Hiroki Kaku's three no-trump. Declarer won in dummy to lead a heart to the jack and queen. Nunn shifted to a diamond to the nine and Sartaj Hans' 10, ducked by declarer, who also ducked the next diamond.

Now a spade came back, so declarer ran the spade and diamond winners. This forced West to discard a club, after which declarer played three rounds of clubs to throw West in, forced to lead hearts into the tenace. (Note that had Hans tried the ruse of false-carding with the diamond queen on the first round of the suit, declarer might have won the trick — and been sunk without a trace).

At another table, where North was declarer in three no-trump, Peter Newell of New Zealand led the diamond queen, ducked all around. After a spade shift, declarer Shen Jiaxing won in dummy and finessed in clubs, then led a heart to the 10 and queen. Martin Reid as West returned a diamond, and declarer took it, cashed all the spades, (East discarding a heart, West a club) then exited with a third diamond to East.

If Newell cashed his last diamond, declarer would discard a heart from dummy and catch West in a simple squeeze. If East did not cash his diamond, but exited with either a heart or a club, Reid would be thrown in with that suit a trick later, to concede an extra trick in the other suit.

Today's deal from the match between Sweden and Italy in the Yeh Bros. Cup shows both sides using unconventional bidding methods. Antonio Sementa's double of the spade-showing one-heart call showed hearts and a minor. Had he simply held hearts, he would have bid two hearts. His partner Giorgio Duboin now drove to game, doubling for takeout at his next turn to speak, and then, when confident that he was facing short spades, forced his partner to pick a minor at the five-level.

Sementa received a spade lead against five diamonds, and took an uncharacteristically long time to play to trick two, seeing the problems with late entries to his own hand. Eventually, he led a trump to dummy to run the heart queen. West, Fredrik Nystrom, won and also took his time before playing ace and another diamond.

Declarer won this in hand, passed the club jack, covered all around, finessed in hearts, then set up the hearts by ruffing with dummy’s last trump. Now he ruffed a spade back to hand, cashed his long heart, and finally took the second club finesse for his 11th trick. Even the ranks of Tuscany could scarce forbear to cheer.

Yes, the cards did not lie unfavorably, but it was up to Sementa to take advantage of the position. In the other room South played four hearts on repeated spade leads, and the defenders could set up a force to defeat that contract.

At the Yeh Bros. tournament last May, this was the first board of the second half of the knockout match between The Netherlands and Australia Youth. The Australian juniors are one of the strongest young teams in the world, and although they lost to the then world champions, they were not disgraced.

For the Dutch, Ricco van Prooijen, West, led the spade six against Liam Milne’s three-no-trump contract, the seven winning in dummy. Next, Milne led a club to the queen and king (yes, setting up spade or heart tricks might have been a perfectly reasonable alternative) and now van Prooijen switched to the heart king. What, you may ask, was he thinking? Well, you will have to wait and see.

In retrospect it might have been better to duck this trick, but Milne made the natural play when he took the trick with his ace and led a spade. Van Prooijen took his ace and switched to the club 10, Louk Verhees overtaking with the jack. Milne ducked, so Verhees continued with the club nine to dummy’s ace, pinning declarer’s eight, and setting up his seven. Now the foresight of the heart king shift revealed itself. Verhees had a club winner ready to cash, and, because of van Prooijen’s earlier play, had the heart queen as an entry to cash it. Maybe this is why Milne should have ducked the heart king and taken the finesse for the queen later, but that is a lot easier to see with a view of all 52 cards.

Today's deal from last year's Yeh Bros. Cup tournament in Yokohama features Bauke Muller of the Netherlands, who was given the equivalent of a knighthood last year. He is the only Dutch player to have played on both their world-title winning teams, in 1993 and 2012.

Here he declared six spades on the lead of the club four, East-West playing third from even and low from an odd number. He drew trump, ending in hand, then took a diamond finesse. When the defenders won and continued clubs, West followed with the club two — confirming an original four-card suit. Now declarer ruffed out the hearts and trumped a club. In the three-card ending, Muller knew East had begun with three spades, two hearts, and four clubs, so he could successfully finesse against the diamond 10. But had West concealed the club two, the count might have been far harder to confirm.

Paul Hackett of England also played slam here, from the North seat, on a trump lead. He won in hand and went to the club ace to take a losing diamond finesse. Back came a trump (yes, a club would be better) so Hackett won and played three rounds of hearts, ruffing in dummy. Then he played the last trump, followed by the diamond jack and a diamond to the ace. Now he cashed the last trump, and both defenders were squeezed. With East guarding diamonds and West guarding hearts, neither could keep a second club. So declarer scored the club eight for his 12th trick.

Today's deal comes from the round-robin of the Yeh Bros. teams championships, which was held in Yokohama this time last year.

Included in the field were the then current Bermuda Bowl world champions from the Netherlands, who went on to win the event in fine style, defeating the top Italian team in the finals. Here are the Dutch at work.

With both tables in the same contract of three spades, Shakespeare had it right when he said “The play’s the thing.” The defense started the same way in both rooms, with a club lead from West to East, who took his three top clubs. In the Closed Room the Japanese West discarded a discouraging heart, and East got off play with a trump. Declarer Simon de Wijs won in hand with the king, drew a second round of trump with the queen, then played on hearts and claimed nine tricks for plus140 since he had a spade entry to allow him to discard a diamond loser on dummy’s heart winner.

In the Open Room Ricco van Prooijen also led the club jack and continued the suit, Louk Verhees also cashing a third round of clubs. But van Prooijen, who could see the possibility of discards coming, thoughtfully ruffed his partner’s winner and led the diamond jack, ducked to the ace. Now declarer led the heart 10 from hand and passed it to East’s ace, but Verhees saw his five defensive winners. After taking his heart ace, he cashed the diamond king for down one, and 5 IMPs.

All the deals this week come from one of the world's most enjoyable tournaments. It is the Yeh Bros. invitational teams and pairs, run by Chen Yeh, a fine player who was on the first Asian team to win a gold medal at bridge in a world championship.

The format is unique: Mister Yeh sponsors top teams from around the world to play, but everyone is welcome to pay. The event has high entry fees and extremely generous prizes, and the only condition of contest is that Mister Yeh’s team is exempt to the knockout (last 16) stage of the teams and the final of the pairs. That way he gets to play against the strongest players in the world.

In today’s deal Bob Scott and John Wignall defended four hearts in this deal from last year’s pairs qualifier. Scott led a top diamond, as Wignall discouraged. Now Scott observed that, with only 16 HCP missing, it would be too much to ask partner to have a natural trick from high cards here. A club shift, while attractive on the surface, could achieve nothing. So what was the least he could find partner with to beat the game?

Scott found the answer when he led three rounds of diamonds, then hopped up with the heart ace at his first turn and played the fourth diamond for Wignall to ruff in with the precious heart 10, promoting the heart nine to the setting trick.