With 26 high-card points and no substantial trump suit, North-South should reach the no-trump game. South's two-no-trump rebid indicates an 18-19 count, and now North has more than enough to continue to game. He could explore for a 5-3 spade fit, but it looks so much better for South to be declarer here that he might as well simply drive to the no-trump game.

Against this contract West leads the heart queen. Declarer can either win or duck the trick, but when he gains the lead, he should know that success or failure in three no-trump will hinge on the play of the spade suit. What are the options?

Since the club suit provides too remote a chance for extra tricks, declarer must attempt to take four spade tricks, and there are no side entries to dummy. By ducking the first spade trick completely, then leading a spade to the ace when he regains the lead, South will garner the necessary tricks if the spades divide 3-3 or if either opponent holds a doubleton queen. This line of play gives a better chance than any other method of managing the spade suit, since the chance of a 3-3 break or the queen coming down in two rounds is approximately 50 percent. By finessing first and then cashing the ace and king, you would hold yourself to at most three spade tricks unless the suit breaks 3-3, and that happens only one third of the time.

Today's deal demonstrates an unusual use of the suit-preference signal. I am sure you are all broadly familiar with the concept of issuing suit-preference signals when giving partner a ruff: You play a low card to get him to switch to the lower outstanding suit, and a high card when you prefer the higher suit. But today's signal showed a different position.

North-South quickly bid to game after South had opened a somewhat idiosyncratic strong no-trump. With all his side’s defensive strength, West started with a top heart, and continued with a heart to East’s 10. East cashed the heart ace and had to decide which suit to play now. The natural switch was to a club, and now declarer had nine tricks when he ran his clubs and read the ending accurately.

What has this got to do with suit-preference signals? you might ask. The point is that West should have shifted to the higher of his two small hearts at trick two, for suit-preference reasons. If East had seen him play the heart nine, then the two, this would have warned East that his partner wanted a play other than a club switch and should have alerted him to the possibility of a layout in which South had a running club suit, similar to the one that existed. If that was the case, a diamond switch would be the only hope at trick four.

Generally speaking, when you have two or more touching honors in a suit, it is normal to lead one of them, while you tend to lead low when you have only a single honor. But, as always, using your brain rather than blindly following rules is a better idea.

When West decided to lead a spade, he did not expect to be on lead again, so he intelligently started with the jack. When this held the trick, he continued with a second spade to East’s king. East switched to a low heart, won, revealingly, with dummy’s queen.

Declarer next played a diamond to his queen, and could have succeeded now by cashing his hearts before continuing with diamonds. After taking his diamond and spade aces, East would have been endplayed to lead into dummy’s club tenace for the ninth trick. However, expecting that this line would set up too many winners for the defense, declarer decided to hope for a doubleton diamond ace. So he continued with a diamond to dummy’s king and then another diamond to East’s ace. East cashed the spade ace, but then had nothing left but clubs and hearts.

East could see that it was important now not to let declarer into his own hand. Covering all his bases, East shifted to the club king, and declarer had to go two down. Note that if he had instead played a low club, declarer would have won the trick with the jack, and he would have claimed the rest.

At the Dyspeptics Club the players always prefer to attribute a poor result to fate rather than to their own incompetence.

In today’s deal, after going down in his spade game, South claimed that there was nothing he could have done to improve his result. He had not chosen the right partner who would substantiate that claim.

As North said, against four spades West had been faced with an awkward lead. If he had chosen a heart and East had switched to diamonds at either the second or third trick, North admitted that he would have been forced to agree with South’s comment, but in practice West had chosen the diamond five for his opening salvo.

Declarer won East’s king with his ace, drew trump, and finessed in clubs. Everything was wrong — the club finesse lost, West was put in with the diamond queen, and now when he returned a heart, there was no winning guess available to declarer, who had to go one off whatever he did.

Yes, South was unlucky — all the missing high cards were badly placed for him — but can you see a much better line of play that would practically have guaranteed his contract? Try letting East’s diamond king win the first trick.

This gives up a second (but irrelevant) natural winner in diamonds, but the point is that West is now kept out of the lead and can never make the punishing heart switch. After this play, declarer would have made 10 tricks painlessly.

On the second round of bidding in today's deal, South must choose between raising clubs and bidding no-trump. With strong stoppers in the unbid suit and mediocre support for clubs, he should go for the nine-trick game rather than the 11-trick game. Of course this is an auction where North can always repeat his clubs at his next turn if his hand is unsuitable.

The appearance of dummy after West’s spade lead should indicate to East that the contract can be defeated only if the defense can run the spade suit when it gains the lead with the diamond ace. East knows that his partner cannot hold much more than a queen outside whatever spade honors he may have,

Since the spade suit may become blocked unless East retains his small spade, he must jettison an honor (the jack is clearly the right card) under dummy’s spade ace. East can then obtain the lead with his diamond ace and will next lead his remaining spade honor through declarer. Even if declarer ducks, East’s last spade will put West on play to cash out the suit.

The defense can thus win one diamond and four spade tricks to defeat the game. But if East parsimoniously plays small at trick one, the spade suit blocks and the defenders cannot take more than two tricks in the suit whatever they do. South emerges with four diamond tricks, three heart tricks, and the black aces for nine tricks.

The following deal came from the under-25 encounter between Norway and Poland at the White House Junior Championship, played this spring in the Witte Huis in Amsterdam.

Against four spades West led the club nine, which systemically meant either that the club nine was a singleton or that West had the club 10 as well. (With nine-doubleton, West would have led his lower card.)

Since there was only one club entry to the dummy for a single heart play toward the South hand, the contract was in theory unmakeable. But declarer spotted a chance when he dropped his jack under East’s club ace.

East shifted to a low diamond, ruffed by South. Now declarer led his low club and finessed dummy’s eight. When that held, South played a heart to his king, overtook his club queen with dummy’s king, and called for another heart. East rose with his ace and led another diamond, but declarer ruffed and played his heart queen, ruffed low by West and overruffed by dummy.

South trumped a diamond in his hand and ruffed a heart on the board (West discarding his diamond ace) and ruffed a diamond with his spade ace. Finally he led his last heart to guarantee one more trump trick, his 10th winner.

West had missed an opportunity to defeat the contract. When South led his low club at trick three, West had to put in his 10. This is a play that is rare in theory, and even less frequently found at the table.

One of the big no-no's of defense is to give declarer a ruff and discard, but when you know there are no more defensive tricks outside of trumps, it is often the most challenging play.

In today’s deal, West was not hard-pressed to start with a low club to East’s ace, and a club came back to the king. Now suppose West gets off lead with a “safe” spade. Declarer wins in dummy, draws trump, cashes the other top spade, then plays the heart ace and ruffs a heart. Declarer can crossruff spades and hearts until eventually all declarer has in hand is a good trump and a good spade, so the game rolls in.

At first glance it doesn’t look as if there is anything the defense can do, but look at what happens if West continues with a third club at trick three. Let us first suppose that declarer ruffs in dummy, discarding a spade from hand. It is relatively clear to see that this line will not succeed, because there are no longer enough trumps in dummy to ruff both spades. (If declarer does not draw trump, it will not be long before West scores his diamond 10.)

The alternative is for declarer to discard a heart from dummy and ruff in hand. But this does not work either, because although he has enough trumps in dummy to ruff the spades good, he will not have a trump left in hand for the entry to the established spade.

With great intermediates and excellent honor combinations, South evaluated his hand to be worth at least 15 points and thus opened the bidding with one no-trump. However, even if South had chosen not to open no-trump, six no-trump would still probably have been reached on this sequence: one club — one heart — one no-trump –four no-trump — six no-trump. North's four-no-trump bid is not Blackwood, but invites South to bid six no-trump with a maximum for his previous bidding.

The key to the play in the slam is that South needs to bring in either the club or the heart suit without loss. In theory each suit involves a finesse, but there is more to it than that. The play of the honors is usually critical, but today South must be cautious about the possible waste of his valuable intermediate cards. There is no merit in leading the club queen or heart 10 on the first round of the suit in order to take either of the finesses. Instead, declarer must lead a low card toward his honors at every opportunity.

Note that South can make four club tricks if he leads low from dummy twice, but only wins three club tricks if he leads the queen for East to cover. In hearts, declarer should cash dummy’s ace or king before taking a finesse, but when he does attempt the heart finesse, he should lead low from his hand.

This way he emerges with 13 tricks, not 11.

In the play of the hand it is generally sound technique to leave the best prospect till last. My experience has been that if a suit is breaking at the start of the hand, it will still be breaking toward the end of the deal; and even the best defenders sometimes let the wrong things go early in the play.

In today’s deal when South opened a strong no-trump and North raised to game, West led the club queen to East’s ace. South ducked the club return but won the next, perforce, East discarding a spade. There are now eight top tricks and the ninth could come from any of the other three suits. The best suit to play on is not diamonds but hearts, and declarer duly led a low heart to dummy’s 10 and East’s jack. Back came a low spade, taken in hand.

There was now time to test hearts for a 3-3 break. When the suit broke 4-2, South threw East in with the fourth round of the suit and East exited with the spade queen, on which West followed with the 10.

Declarer now knew that West had started with five clubs, and East appeared to have begun with five spades — the clue being his spade discard at trick three. Accordingly, South decided West had a doubleton in each major and thus four diamonds. So he continued with the diamond ace and queen. When both opponents followed, he finessed against West’s diamond jack for his ninth trick.