Against six diamonds West leads the heart queen. As the spade ace will surely be wrong, given West's vulnerable two-suited action, how do you plan to make 12 tricks?

You need to bring pressure to bear on West in the endgame, and the entry position requires you to win the heart queen in hand with the ace, then draw two rounds of trump with the ace and another honor, say the jack. Then you must make the key play of cashing dummy’s three top clubs, throwing a heart from hand. (You need to have the lead in hand as you put West’s feet to the fire.) If you take all your trumps at once, you have to discard prematurely from the North hand. You now settle down to run the rest of the trumps.

After a heart, six trumps, and three clubs have been played, you will have generated a three-card ending in which West will have to reduce to a singleton spade or a singleton heart, while dummy has yet to discard, with two spades and two hearts. If West lets a spade go, throw a heart from dummy and then lead the spade seven to West’s now bare ace; you will take the last two tricks with your major-suit kings. If West pitches a heart instead, he will have only one heart remaining, so throw a spade from dummy and cash the heart king; dummy’s heart six will now be good for your 12th trick.

How do you plan the play in six spades on the lead of the heart ace? Obviously, since trumps are under control, the most likely problem comes when clubs are 4-1.

As you will need to exert pressure on the defender who has four clubs, you should tighten the projected ending by discarding a club at trick one! After ruffing the next heart, you will draw trumps, cash the club ace-king, and claim 12 tricks if they split.

If East has four clubs, you need him also to have sole control of diamonds. Then, after all of the trumps are played, he will have to keep four cards, most probably two clubs and two diamonds, and the diamond 10 will become a winner.

What will you do if West has four clubs? All you need for West to hold in addition to his four clubs is at least one diamond honor. Cash the diamond king and run the trumps to reduce to a five-card ending with one trump, two clubs and two diamonds in hand and one heart, one diamond and three clubs on the board.

When you play the last trump, West must keep all his clubs, but throwing the diamond jack will let you finesse the diamond 10. So West parts with his last heart, and you pitch dummy’s small club. Now when you cash the king and queen of clubs, East has no recourse. A heart discard establishes dummy’s heart five, while pitching a second diamond sees your diamond A-10 take the last two tricks.

When West led the heart king against six spades, declarer took it and played the two top trumps, both defenders following. He then turned to the club suit. If East had held the last trump, the slam would have been made. East could ruff in whenever he chose, but he would have no heart to return. Declarer could then discard both his heart losers on dummy's clubs. But today it was West who ruffed the third club, and he cashed two hearts to put the slam two down.

Since you are booked to lose a trump trick, even if the spade suit breaks 3-2, the critical trump trick must be lost to East, who is known to be the safe hand. After winning the heart lead, you should play a trump toward your hand and win with the ace. You then return to dummy with a diamond to lead another trump. When the queen appears from East, you must duck. You can then win East’s return, draw the last trump, and discard your two heart losers. This play is indicated because hearts are known to be 6-1. Had West not bid, the line found at the table would probably have been best.

Incidentally, you would make the same sort of play if your trumps were A-Q-7-6-3. After finessing the spade queen, you would return to dummy to lead a second round of trumps. Whenever the spade king appeared from East, you would duck it, keeping West off lead for the duration of the deal.

How should you play six clubs on a heart lead? Does this deal require card-play technique or elements of psychology?

The best mathematical chance of success is to win the heart ace. Next play the diamond ace and ruff a diamond high. You can cash the club ace, lead the club 10 to the jack, then ruff another diamond. If the diamond king has fallen, you will have created a home for your heart loser. If not, you can always fall back on the spade finesse. This line allows you to take your chances in echelon; but the extra chance that you have built for yourself is less than 10 percent.

Contrast this approach with winning the heart ace at trick one and looking for a more psychological line. Simply call for the spade queen, then use your bridge judgment to gauge East’s reaction to this play.

Even if East is a real expert, he would have to be truly inspired not to cover this card, or at least to consider doing so. If East ducks the spade queen without thought, then you should assume that West has the spade king. If so, you should rise with the spade ace, draw trump, and try to take the diamond finesse to discard your heart loser. Against any but the very best defenders (and there are precious few of them!), this line has a 75 percent chance of success.

In today's deal, North-South need to be able to judge the presence or absence of the two black jacks in order to see what level they should play at. If they had both of those cards, a grand slam would be the target, while with one of them, 12 tricks would be a cakewalk. However, with neither of them, some careful play is required for declarer to give himself every opportunity to bring home 12 tricks.

So how are you going to make six spades after the diamond-queen lead? Presumably, you start by drawing trump. When West shows out on the second round, the focus shifts to trying to avoid losing a club and a trump if neither suit behaves.

Since East has trump length, he rates to be short in clubs, if anyone is. (If he is long in both suits, it will be easy to play to ruff a club on the board.)

You need to protect yourself against both 4-2 and 5-1 club breaks. You cannot afford to have a club honor ruffed away, so play a club to the ace and a club toward your hand. It does not help East to trump in, since he would be ruffing a loser. Win the club king and cross back to dummy with the heart king to lead another club toward your hand. Again, it doesn’t help East to ruff, so he discards again. Now you can ruff a club in dummy. East can overruff, but that will be his only trick.

Sam Fry Jr. was one of the original 10 life masters appointed by the ACBL and the hero of today's deal. When it came up, somewhat different conventions were the norm, and Fry could make a penalty double of three spades.

South took the lead of the heart king and played the spade king. It looks natural for West to win this — but he would then have had to guess what to do next.

But Fry ducked the spade king — which could hardly cost, since he was not going to score all of his small trumps whatever he did. He hoped to get a meaningful signal from his partner on the next trump, and that was what transpired. West took the spade-queen lead with the ace and, noting his partner’s diamond eight, switched to the diamond three. East won the diamond ace and found the obvious club shift. Since Fry knew from his partner’s play of the two that he had at most four cards in the suit, he could put in the nine. The defense took two trumps, two diamonds and two clubs for plus 500.

West can also succeed by shifting to the club queen when in with the trump ace. But if South had begun with both the club jack and 10, West needs to play a diamond to collect his 500.

Just for the record, nowadays West would surely bid three no-trump over three spades and would have failed by at least two tricks. Sometimes the old ways are the best.

Consider your line of play in six clubs from London's TGR's bridge club, on a trump lead.

If clubs are 2-2, then you could draw trump and play off hearts, making 13 tricks should hearts break 3-3. If hearts are 4-2, you discard one diamond and then ruff the hearts good but make only 12 tricks, since you eventually run out of trumps.

Equally, if hearts break while clubs do not, then you can make 13 tricks by simply playing out your other top hearts while discarding diamonds. Then you ruff a diamond, cross back to hand with a trump, ruff another diamond, cross back to hand with a spade, ruff to draw trump, and claim the remainder.

However, what you need to do is find a safer line for the slam if neither suit breaks. If you draw three rounds of trump but then find hearts are 4-2, you will need East to hold the diamond ace if you are going to come to 12 tricks. On the other hand, if you play off three rounds of hearts immediately (discarding diamonds) and East ruffs and returns a trump, you will go down.

The solution is somewhat counterintuitive: What you must do is play off two top hearts, discarding a diamond, and then play a diamond. Even if the defenders could win and play another trump (which on the actual lie of the cards they cannot), you still have two trumps in dummy, one to ruff the hearts good, and one to ruff a diamond.

West leads the heart king against your three-no-trump contract and persists with the suit. You win the heart ace on the third round, and with eight top tricks must aim to develop a ninth from one of the minor suits, without allowing West on lead. What is your plan?

Looking for a 3-3 break in the club suit can wait. The first priority is to seek an extra trick from the diamonds. If the suit breaks 3-3, two extra tricks will drop into your lap. Life will also be easy when East holds four diamonds, since you can concede a fourth round to the safe hand. The key situation occurs when West holds four diamonds; in that case you must aim to duck an early diamond trick to East.

At trick four, you lead the diamond nine, intending to run that card to East. Let’s suppose that West thwarts you temporarily by covering with the jack. You win the trick in dummy and return to your hand with the club king. You then lead the diamond four toward dummy. West cannot afford to rise with the 10 or you will make all five diamond tricks. He plays low and you cover with dummy’s seven, ducking the trick into the safe hand. East wins with the eight and you have ensured your contract when he follows suit. What is more, you will be spared the annoyance of finding that clubs were 3-3 all along!

In today's deal South had no problem in driving to game once his partner raised his suit. Making game proved to be a far more challenging proposition. In the contract of four spades I suggest that it would be the norm rather than the exception to rely on the club finesse here, but declarer can do considerably better.

After the lead of the heart king is taken by the ace, declarer draws trump and exits with a second heart. The best the defenders can do is for West to win and lead a club through, realizing that declarer must have a hole in the club suit — and that if all he needed to do was set up clubs, he would not have given up a heart.

Rather than waste dummy’s club jack, declarer plays low from the board and wins in hand, then leads a diamond, covering West’s card. East can take his diamond king and ace, but then has nowhere to turn. A club gives up the whole suit, while a diamond or heart lets South discard his club loser and ruff on the board.

For this line of play to succeed, all declarer needs is to find both high diamonds with East. If West has one of the top diamonds and more than one club, declarer falls back on the club finesse. Effectively this play turns a 50-50 contract into one where you will succeed at least two times out of three.