Today’s problem poses a double challenge. Not only do you have to find the right defense, but you also have to try to protect your partner from finding the wrong play – and bear in mind that it sometimes seems that most of the players we associate with will find the wrong play even if no reasonable possibility of error exists at all.

You are East, defending three no-trump, after partner, who opened a weak two hearts, leads the heart king. Declarer wins with dummy’s ace and you have to make your first decision as to what to discard. Let’s say you pitch a small spade, and declarer now leads a low club from dummy. What should you do, and why?

The correct answer is that you should win the club queen and shift to diamonds – but specifically, you should play ace and another diamond. No other suit has any realistic chance of garnering the defenders enough tricks in time.

However, notice the effect of shifting to a low diamond initially, rather than playing the ace and a second diamond. If you do that, your partner might well cover South’s jack with the queen, setting up a second diamond stopper for declarer.

Since you need to find partner with the diamond queen, you might as well make sure that nothing bad happens should the cards lie as you project. Playing the ace and another diamond prevents partner from making a mistake, and thus saves you a few decades in limbo.

Ely Culbertson was credited with playing today's deal. Against his slam of six spades West cashed the heart ace, then shifted to the club 10. With 11 top tricks in view, Culbertson correctly decided that the diamond suit offered a better chance for the 12th than the straightforward club finesse. So he rose with the club ace and played six rounds of trump, discarding two clubs from table.

Next came the diamond ace-queen. When East proved to hold the diamond suit, declarer’s only hope was that East held the club king too. So Culbertson led out the spade nine and threw the club jack from the table. East, who had to discard from his diamond J-9 and the club king chose the latter. So Culbertson took the last two tricks with the club queen and diamond king.

This is a perfect example of the Vienna Coup, where declarer’s best play is to take the club ace early to avoid squeezing dummy on the run of the spade winners.

It could be argued that West’s shift to a club was naïve, since it forced declarer into the winning line. However, if West plays a trump at trick two, declarer might well ask why he had not shifted to a club. Would he be more likely to do so with the club king or without it Depending on just how good (or bad) a player West is, you might reasonably assume that he would never shift to a club if he had the king.

Today’s deal comes from a correspondent, more in sorrow than anger, who has asked me not to name him – or his errant partner. The opportunity for a “free finesse” seemed too good to miss for South on this deal. He had been given a far better chance of making our game than he deserved!

When West opened three clubs and East raised to five clubs, South should have doubled, after which North would have bid five hearts and might have struggled after a club lead.

But instead of doubling, South made the undisciplined bid of five hearts and everybody passed. West led the spade two and, rather naively, declarer tried dummy’s jack. He won East’s queen with the ace and drew trump; but there was no way for him to avoid the loss of a spade and two diamonds when the spades broke badly.

As North subsequently indicated, West had surely not made an opening lead from queen-third of spades. If you assume that the lead rates to be from shortage, the rest of the play is easy. You play low from dummy, win with the ace, ruff the two losing clubs in dummy while drawing trump, then get off lead with ace and another diamond. The defenders can take their two diamond tricks, but if West is left on lead, he has to concede a ruff and discard; and, if East wins the third diamond, he can do no better than lead a spade into dummy’s tenace.

North-South used the fact that this was rubber bridge to justify their exuberant bidding to six spades. A favorable lead seemed to give declarer good chances, but the bad heart break required South to play extremely well to justify his optimism.

After winning the trump lead in hand, declarer cashed the heart ace, crossed to dummy with a trump, and ruffed a low heart. Then he went to dummy with another trump and ruffed one more heart.

When West showed out, this appeared to put the final nail in the coffin for South’s contract. But declarer was quick to spot that he was still in business because East, who guarded the hearts, might well have at least two of the missing club honors. Declarer drew the last trump and followed with three rounds of diamonds, ending in dummy. This left him with three clubs in hand, and dummy with the king-jack of hearts and the club queen. Meanwhile East had to make a discard from the Q-10 of hearts and the club A-J.

Since a heart or the club jack would be immediately fatal, East made a good try by discarding his ace. But there was no joy — declarer followed with the club queen, pinning East’s jack. If West won, he could only lead a club into South’s 10-8 tenace. If West ducked, then the heart king would be South’s 12th trick. This is a fine example of the squeeze known as a “winkle.”

The Rueful Rabbit, who had recently taken up two-over-one game-forcing, was proud to show off his mastery of the methods. His two-club response was forcing to game, and he could rebid his clubs to show extras. When North removed three no-trump to four clubs, it was incumbent upon the Rabbit to cuebid four diamonds, but when he simply raised to game, North had no choice but to pass.

On the lead of the spade 10, North put down his dummy somewhat apprehensively and asked what contract they should have been in. The Rabbit said “six,” and dummy absentmindedly played the spade six! The stickler for the rules in the East seat insisted on the six being played, and the Rabbit did not feel inclined to argue.

Remarkably, though, from that point on the contract could not be defeated – since even if East could work out to discard and West shifts to a diamond, declarer simply wins and draws trumps, then crosses to the heart ace, plays the spade ace followed by the queen, and pitches two diamonds on these tricks. The loser-on-loser play gets rid of all of declarer’s diamonds.

However, if declarer takes the spade ace at the first trick, East will ruff and play on diamonds to leave declarer without recourse. If declarer covers with the spade queen at trick one, he will then have to read the position very well to come home with 11 tricks.

I’m reluctant to impose sophisticated conventional calls on my readers, but in today’s deal the North-South pair were using an artificial series of calls after Stayman to distinguish between those balanced hands with slam interest that had four–card support for partner, and those that did not. Their agreement was to use a jump to four no-trump after Stayman as quantitative, not Blackwood, and to use four diamonds as agreeing partner’s major with a balanced hand.

South heard his partner make a slam-try and decided his extra shape and nice controls were enough to drive to slam after Blackwood. Indeed, six hearts was a decent contract, but required careful play.

When West led his singleton club, declarer could see he had six tricks in the side suits. To come to 12 tricks, he would need to score two ruffs in one hand or the other and draw trumps after that. Thus he needed to play for ruffs before drawing trump.

He took the opening club lead with the ace and returned the suit. West showed out, correctly discarding a spade rather than ruffing in. Declarer won his club king and now took the top spades, ruffed a spade low, then gave up a club. East won and played a fourth club, and declarer ruffed high and drew trumps, relying on the 3-2 break.

Notice that if declarer plays to take diamond ruffs in dummy with a low trump, then a high trump, East can overruff early and defeat the slam.

How will you give yourself the best chance in your no-trump game when West leads the spade king? You hold up the spade ace until the third round, leaving East with no spade to play.

So far, so good. Now four diamond tricks will give you the contract, but you need to duck a diamond trick into East, the safe hand. Any ideas as to how to proceed?

If you simply play ace, king and another diamond, you will succeed only when East holds three of the five outstanding diamonds. A better idea is to lead twice toward the dummy, planning to duck if the lowest missing diamond (the seven) appears from West. So at trick two you lead a low diamond from your hand. If West plays the seven, you will duck in the dummy, knowing that East, the nondanger hand, will have to overtake. It makes no difference what East returns. When diamonds break 3-2, you will score four tricks in the suit and claim the contract.

Suppose instead that West inserts the diamond 10 on the first round. You will win with dummy’s ace and return to your hand with a club (or a heart) to lead another diamond. This time, West has to play the seven, or you will make all five diamond tricks. You duck in the dummy, and again East has to overtake with his remaining card. Once more, you have nine tricks.

When this deal came up at the rubber-bridge table, where the priority is to make your contract, not struggle for possibly irrelevant overtricks, declarer played too fast and suffered the consequences.

After a Stayman auction, North-South identified their heart fit, and the opening lead was the spade king to the ace. Declarer immediately won and led a diamond to the queen to play a trump to the king. When this held, but West showed out, declarer was doomed to lose three trump tricks and a spade, since East was left with the A-Q-9 of trumps poised over dummy’s J-10 of hearts.

The best policy on the deal is to focus on what you can afford to lose. The answer is that you do not mind losing two trump tricks, just so long as you do not lose three. After the initial spade lead, the defenders are not threatening a ruff, so you can afford to tackle trump safely.

Win the spade lead, then immediately lead a low heart at trick two toward the J-10. This limits declarer’s losses to two trumps and a spade, no matter which defender has the four trumps. The point is that once you discover who has the long trump, you can take the appropriate evasive action to negotiate the hearts, and the defenders can score only their two high trumps whatever they do.

Some deals present problems for the expert that would not occur to a beginner or an intermediate. So if you do not find the winning line in today’s deal, you can console yourself knowing that when an international player was presented with this slam, he went down like a stone. Thus you may be able to put yourself in good company – or if you succeed, you can claim your spot at the next world championship.

You must plan the play in six hearts after North’s support double has found an easy way for you to identify your fit and to reach the heart slam. West hits on the lead of the diamond queen.

Which hand will you win the trick in – and what will you do next? If West has jack-fourth of trumps, you would need to guess that from the start and in practice you will never do that. If East has J-x-x-x of trumps you can pick up the suit easily. But what if East has five trumps?

To preserve your entries, win your diamond king, play a heart to dummy’s king, and discover the hostile break. Next take a heart finesse, then lead a spade to the king and take another heart finesse. That allows you to draw trump and knock out the club ace while you still have a diamond entry to reach dummy’s clubs.

If you start trumps by leading the ace, you will be unable to pick up the suit.