This deal was declared by John Crawford, a great American player of the early postwar years. I've substituted an auction that might occur today. After an opening call of two no-trump, it is common to play transfers at both the three- and four-level. The Texas transfer at the four-level is either to play or to be followed by Blackwood, while a transfer and raise is a mild slam-try.

Against four spades West led the heart two and Crawford took East’s heart king with the ace. Next he played the spade king, followed by the spade jack to the ace. Then came a heart to the nine and 10. West now shifted to clubs, declarer capturing East’s 10 with his ace.

Crawford next played the heart jack from his hand and discarded the club jack when West covered this with the queen. West did his best when he exited with a club, which was ruffed in dummy. Now the spade five to the queen allowed Crawford to eliminate the club suit by ruffing the club in dummy. Finally came a diamond to the 10, and when West won the diamond queen, he then had either to lead a diamond or concede a ruff-and-discard. Either way Crawford had his 10th trick.

It is hard to criticize West unduly, but a black-suit lead would have seen four spades fail since declarer does not have the timing right for the endplay on West.

I would expect East to pass as dealer here, then double at his second turn to speak. If South could redouble to show a strong hand, there is something to be said for that action, after which East would retreat to two diamonds. Now 300 is available by doubling this, but at most forms of scoring, there is a lot to be said for aiming higher, since if you bid three no-trump and make it, the rewards are far higher.

At many tables East would unthinkingly win the first diamond and try to cash the suit from the top. That would make sense if South had a doubleton diamond, but how likely is that? Not very likely, I’d say.

East does best to duck the first or second diamond, stopping the easy route home via the club finesse. Declarer has a counter: He must run the hearts, forcing East to make two discards. The first one, a small spade, is easy; the second appears relatively innocuous as well, in that he must throw an apparently irrelevant small club. But then declarer has to reconstruct the hand. Since East appears to have started with four spades, two hearts and five diamonds, he either has the bare club king or he doesn’t. South must cash the club ace and exit with his remaining diamond. East is now endplayed; he can cash his diamonds but in the three-card ending he must lead into dummy’s spade tenace and concede the rest.

Here is one of Edgar Kaplan's favorite deals, from a duplicate pairs long ago. To appreciate it fully, cover up the East and West cards.

Against four spades doubled, West led the heart king, then played the ace and a third heart, hoping partner could overruff dummy. Kaplan, sitting East, could infer that West was void in spades and that four hearts would make 10 tricks. So the task at hand was for the defense to set declarer three tricks. When North played the third heart, declarer ruffed in dummy with the nine. Kaplan casually discarded the diamond five, apparently unable to overruff. Declarer now played a spade from dummy to his ace and was shocked when West discarded.

Declarer could do nothing but lead another spade. Kaplan won, played his last diamond, and obtained the diamond ruff for the necessary penalty of 800 and matchpoint top.

Of course, there was considerable discussion between North and South. South explained to his partner that despite all appearances to the contrary, he had heard of a finesse, but he argued that he could never play East for the king when he didn’t overruff the heart.

North had little sympathy for his partner, but 20-20 hindsight makes the game much easier. In my opinion it was a neat play and apt to work against almost anyone. However, it wouldn’t have succeeded against you or me. Or would it?

Today's deal emphasizes the point that bridge is not a game that you can learn by mastering one theme and extrapolating it to other deals.

First of all, let’s see what happened at the unsuccessful table in a teams match. Against three no-trump, the heart queen was led to the ace. The diamond 10 went to the ace, and declarer took the losing spade finesse. The next heart was ducked and South won the third rouind of hearts, throwing a spade from dummy. At this point he must have felt confident he was going to succeed. After all, if West had the diamond queen, the finesse would work. If East had it, the hearts were not a threat.

But when declarer led the diamond nine and West showed out, East ducked. Now the contract was no longer makable. With no entries to dummy there were just eight tricks.

Declarer had in a sense done well. If he takes the diamond finesse immediately, East clears hearts and the contract will depend on the success or failure of the spade finesse. However, at the other table South led the spade jack from his hand at trick two, a truly unnatural play, but one that would generate nine tricks no matter how the defense played. When West took the trick and continued the attack on hearts, South ducked, won the third round of hearts, and now ran the diamond 10. Whether East took this or the next diamond, South had four diamond winners and nine tricks.

I am always happy to receive deals from my readers. It doesn't matter that they didn't find the right play at the table, as long as the theme is an interesting one. We can all learn from real-life hands, even when not played by experts.

Today, Orville St. Clair, declarer in six no-trump, won the helpful spade lead in hand with the jack. West should surely have led a heart here — not that it would have worked out any better.

Now declarer finessed the spade queen, more to find out how many tricks he needed in the other suits than with great confidence that it would hold. Once the finesse worked, South was up to 11 sure winners, so correctly decided to set up a threat in hearts by leading a low one from dummy and putting in the nine. He was delighted to see it hold the trick.

Of course, if East had split his honors, declarer would have had 12 top tricks. As it was, South was now playing for a 13th winner. The best order to take the tricks is the heart ace, then one club and the spade ace, discarding a heart from hand. East has to pitch a diamond, and declarer must decide if he had begun with three diamonds and four clubs (when the three top diamonds would squeeze him in clubs and hearts) or with his actual hand, when cashing the clubs squeezes East in diamonds and hearts. St. Clair read the position accurately and brought home 13 tricks.

When defending against a major-suit game, you might be tempted to try to cash an ace in another suit. But sometimes you have to resist temptation.

Not every North-South reached four spades in this deal from the 2002 European Teams Championships. Those who did, but did not receive a club lead, had no difficulty in coming to 10 tricks by way of five spades and five diamonds. However, in the match between Israel and Poland, Michael Barel had no problem leading clubs after Yoram Aviram’s helpful hint in the auction. The four-club call guaranteed heart support and showed where his values lay. Aviram’s bid led Barel to the best lead, the club ace. East overtook the club jack continuation, then cashed the club king. It must have been tempting to continue with the heart ace, as West’s overcall promised no more than a six-card suit. But when West pitched a low heart, Aviram realized that his partner had started with a seven-card suit, and the heart winner was not going to stand up. Had West started with six hearts, he would have pitched a high heart.

Equally, with his trump holding of 10-9-8, Aviram appreciated that West only needed to hold the spade jack or queen, be it doubleton or singleton, for the contract to be defeated. So he continued with a fourth round of clubs, and sure enough, West ruffed with the spade jack, elevating East’s trump holding to the setting trick.

Against your six-spade contract the opening lead is the diamond three. You win the ace, RHO playing the eight. Plan the play to protect against as many bad breaks as possible.

After winning dummy’s diamond ace, play the spade ace, and now switch your attention to hearts. Lead out the queen, then play to the heart king.

If West discards on the second heart, win, ruff a heart, then lead a trump to dummy and run the hearts. It doesn’t matter if the third heart is overruffed since you can ruff a diamond in dummy, then draw the last trump; equally, West’s ruffing in on the second heart would clearly be fatal.

If it was East who could ruff the second heart to play a club, win with the ace, cross in spades (drawing the opponent’s last trump), then ruff a heart, ruff a club, and run the hearts.

What happens if hearts are 5-0? If RHO ruffs the heart queen, you may still survive in much the same way as before. You simply need to take a heart finesse somewhere along the line after drawing the last trump. If LHO ruffs the heart queen, you will still survive if he does not have a third trump to play. (You have just enough entries to set up the long heart.) All in all, six spades makes except against 4-0 trumps or against a combined very bad heart break and trump break, when nothing would have worked.

When the world championships took place in Beijing four years ago, the main event followed the qualifying stages. Here is a sparkling piece of play from Round 16 of that event.

As Mark Horton, a journalist, remarked, one of the delights of Beijing is the opportunity to enjoy its famous Peking duck, but that is not the only dish it offers. This cosmopolitan city ofers a wide range of international cuisine. Poland’s Ewa Harasimowicz conjured up a wonderful dish at the table. It featured a coulis of squeeze, a dash of throw-in garnished with an endplay, the whole thing being stirred with a Morton’s Fork.

Against four hearts West led the club seven. East took the ace and returned the suit, West winning and playing a third round, ruffed by declarer. Knowing that East, who had already showed up with the club ace-queen, was unlikely to have the diamond ace, declarer played a low diamond toward dummy’s king. West could not afford to play the ace or the spade loser would go away. When the diamond king held, declarer settled down to run the trump suit.

In the five-card ending, West had three spades and the ace-jack of diamonds, but had to discard the diamond jack on the last trump. Now declarer could exit with the queen of diamonds to endplay West to lead a spade around to declarer’s jack.

Today's deal was played in the quarterfinals of the world championships in Beijing four years ago. At most tables East showed both minors, West selected diamonds, and North doubled for takeout. Can you guess what should happen next? Let's see what happened in the match between the Netherlands and Germany.

In the first room the German South, Joseph Piekarek, sat for the double of three diamonds. The heart lead got the defenders off on the right track (not everybody found it). Declarer now had no chance to avoid losing one trick in each major, two clubs and two trumps, down 500.

The Dutch South, Huub Bertens, escaped from three diamonds doubled to three spades, and I’m sure if the German East-West had known their teammates had collected 500, they would have happily conceded 140. But East chose to double Bertens in the pass-out seat to show extras for his two-suited action, a good idea in theory. West passed it out, and his opening club lead went to the queen and king. But that persuaded East to continue the suit rather than shift to diamonds. Declarer won the club ace, then led a heart to the queen and another heart to the 10 and ace. Now he ruffed a club, led a spade to the six, cashed the heart king, and led a fourth heart, pitching a second diamond.

West could ruff in, but Bertens could trump the next diamond in dummy, draw one more round of spades, then run hearts and give West his trump trick for plus-730.