At matchpoints, once a major-suit fit has been found, it is hardly ever right to change directions and head toward a minor suit or no-trump. But at the slam level, however, it may pay to abandon a 5-3 major fit in favor of a 4-4 minor, and no-trump could be selected, either for matchpoint reasons or because it may survive a weakness in the major.

Both these factors influenced one of my readers, Barton Bloom, in bidding seven no-trump in today’s deal. He was not using Keycard Blackwood, a convention that allows you to locate the subsidiary trump honors. He had visualized better spades in the dummy and saw little advantage in playing spades rather than no-trump.

Unfortunately, the hole in the spade suit meant that any grand slam was virtually hopeless. But Bloom did not give up. He began by winning the opening lead of the diamond-king with the ace and cashing four heart winners.

Even though South had begun with only 10 tricks, with an 11th trick to come from a club finesse, he was able to exert huge pressure on West. When he led the last heart, he could turn 11 tricks into 13. At the table West threw a club, and now the club finesse brought home the grand slam. A spade discard would have been equally fatal, and throwing the diamond queen would have been only a temporary salvation. The diamond 10 would have put West through the wringer again.

The North hand is somewhat difficult to judge when South has shown a very strong hand with hearts. The second-round diamond control does not look valuable, so maybe signing off at every turn is a reasonable approach.

As South, you of course do not know about the wasted high cards opposite. When you bid slam, you’d better make it if you don’t want to hear complaints about your overbidding, and underplaying the hand. What should be your thoughts when you receive the lead of the club 10?

The idea here should be to avoid taking the spade finesse if at all possible. On the given layout your plan should be to endplay West when he has no winning exit card.

After winning the first trick with the club ace, you cross to dummy with the trump nine and ruff the diamond five high. Next you cash the club king and ruff the club four, eliminating that suit. You proceed to ruff dummy’s diamond seven high, which allows you to return to dummy by leading the trump six to dummy’s eight. Now comes the key play — you will lead the diamond king and discard the spade five from hand.

After West wins this trick with the ace, he has no good return. A spade exit will run to your ace-queen while a fourth round of diamonds will see you ruff in dummy and discard the spade queen from hand. Either way, you make 12 tricks.

You reach four spades after East has opened one heart. West leads the heart two. Plan the play — and to make the problem more challenging, cover up the East and West cards before making your decision.

Today’s deal is all about avoidance. You must duck your heart ace at trick one, since you want to cut the defenders’ communications. If a diamond comes back, you can put up the queen, and if it loses to the king, you will know to take the trump finesse since East must have that card to make up his opening bid.

Whether East shifts to a diamond or not, you will be able to cash the spade ace and king, play on clubs, and the defenders will never score a diamond trick. The point is that West will never be able to get on lead in time to play diamonds through the ace.

However, if you make the mistake of winning the first trick with the heart ace, the best you can do is to cash your top spades next and take the club finesse. East can win the club king and then put West in with the heart jack. Now a diamond switch will beat the contract, since even if you put up the ace and play on clubs, West will be able to ruff in. He can then cash his side’s diamond trick before you have been able to establish a discard for yourself.

Against six spades, West leads the heart 10, won with your ace, but on the first trump, East discards a club. Can you recover?

You will have to start by discarding dummy’s diamond losers on your two spare heart winners. You play the diamond ace at trick three, cross to the club king, and cash the club queen.

You next play the heart king and queen, throwing dummy’s remaining diamonds. When you lead the trump five, West does best to split his honors, preventing you from finessing dummy’s eight. You win his trump 10 with the queen and ruff the club four with your remaining trump, the nine.

While dummy’s last four cards are the trump K-8-3 and club ace, West still has to play to this trick, holding J-7-6 of trumps and a low card in each red suit. He is now on the horns of a dilemma. If he overruffs with the jack, you will be able to ruff his red-suit return in dummy, draw trump, and claim the balance. If instead he discards, you will lead a red card and score a ruff with dummy’s trump three. You can then exit with the club ace, which West ruffs, and score the K-8 of trumps on his return.

(Incidentally, if East had all five trumps, you would need to find him with exactly 5-3-1-4 pattern. If so, you could cash all the side suits, ruff the fourth club, then exit with the spade nine to East to endplay him in trumps.)

The German Women's Team won their Round Robin group at the 1st World Mind Sports Games. When they met the Netherlands, the runners-up in their section, the contract at both tables was three no-trump.

Both Wests found the only lead to give declarer problems — a spade. Both Souths took East’s jack with the ace and continued with a club toward dummy. The West players both correctly ducked. This play was not just trying to restrict declarer’s communications, but was also hoping for a suit-preference signsl from partner as to the best continuation after West won the club ace. The order of East’s play in the club suit should help West out.

Declarer has eight tricks, so just needs one more from the red suits. At one table, after West won the club ace, she cashed the diamond ace, then led the queen — the right play if East had started with four diamonds to the king along with either the nine or eight. It was a nice idea, but not in this layout.

At the other table, West continued with a heart to the ace, and back came a diamond. Declarer ducked, so West cashed the queen, then the ace, but that gave South her ninth trick.

The only return to defeat declarer is another spade. South wins and plays a heart honor. East captures this, then puts declarer in dummy with a club. Declarer must cash her black suit winners, but in the process she will squeeze herself and lose the last three tricks.

In today's deal North's raise to two hearts is the most flexible action with a single spade guard, even though three no-trump would have been an easier spot as the cards lie.

How would you play the heart game when West leads the spade king?

Suppose you win with the ace and begin to draw trumps. The 4-1 break means you will not be able to set up a 10th trick in diamonds before you have lost control of the hand. So after winning the spade lead, you should immediately lead a low diamond to the nine.

West wins with the jack and persists with another spade. You ruff in hand and play three rounds of trumps, leaving East with the trump 10, and yourself with the jack. You then cross to dummy with the club king and lead another low diamond, hoping to see an honor appear from East. East produces a low diamond, but you guess to put in the eight, which forces West’s ace.

That player forces you to ruff a spade with your last trump (the jack), but when you play the diamond king, the suit proves to be 3-3. East is welcome to ruff the fourth round of diamonds with his established trump 10, because he will have no spade to return. So the game comes home.

The moral is that whenever it may take some time to establish a needed trick in a side suit, consider playing on the side suit before drawing all the trumps.

Today's deal comes from a recent English tournament called the Tollemache — the county teams of eight championships, with one weekend of qualifying and a six-team final.

South was correct to start with two no-trump with his balanced 21-count, despite the five-card heart suit. One of the problems with the call is that the partnership may need to unearth a 5-3 fit (not easy when playing regular Stayman).

To solve the problem, as is not uncommon in the tournament world, North’s three clubs asked for five-card majors, and thus the eight-card fit was found (though it is far from clear that four hearts is any better a contract than three no-trump).

With an awkward choice of opening lead, West led a low trump to the jack and ace. Declarer could see that he would succeed regardless of the position of the diamond king if the club honors were split, provided he could create two entries to dummy. He could clearly reach dummy with either the heart queen or nine, but where was the other entry to come from?

Declarer found the solution when at trick two he led the diamond queen. West had no counter to this gambit. If he won this trick, declarer could later reach dummy with the jack, while if he ducked, declarer would be able to ruff his third-round loser in the dummy. Now he would no longer mind that he had to lose two club tricks.

Today's deal, from a knockout match, featured some excellent play and defense, after a well-judged sequence where North made a slam-try and South drove straight to six hearts.

Superficially, the slam appears to depend on East holding either the club queen or the diamond ace (so a spade can be discarded from one hand or the other).

At one table declarer won the spade lead in hand, cashed the heart ace, and played a heart to dummy. He now played a diamond to his king, which West astutely ducked in perfect tempo. Convinced that East held the diamond ace, declarer crossed back to dummy with a third trump and played a second diamond. This time West won and played the diamond jack to remove dummy’s last trump. Now declarer could not avoid a spade loser.

At the other table South used his entries more efficiently. At trick two he crossed to dummy with a heart and played a diamond immediately. As it happened, West won and declarer now played successfully for the club finesse. However, if West had ducked, declarer would have crossed to dummy with a second trump and played a second diamond. West would have won this and taken a trump out of dummy by playing a third round of diamonds. But now declarer would have been able to take the club finesse, cash the club ace, and cross back to dummy with a trump. He would then have discarded his spade loser on dummy’s club king.

At the top level of bridge, partnership agreement about signals and discards is as important as agreements in bidding.

Today’s deal comes from a recent European championship match between Romania and Italy, the eventual winners.

At both tables West led a low club against three no-trump. When the Italians were defending, the Romanian declarer won the club queen at trick one, cashed the diamond ace, and played a diamond toward dummy’s jack. Nunes (West) discarded the heart six and Fantoni wasted no time in switching to the spade nine, ensuring that the defenders took four tricks in that suit.

In my view it should have been easier for the Romanians at the other table. Here Lorenzo Lauria, declarer for Italy, won the club queen, cashed the diamond ace and then crossed to dummy’s heart jack to run the diamond jack.

This told everybody that declarer had four heart tricks, and West could surely tell that he had at least three diamond tricks (given his play) and two clubs. So, West should have discarded a club, suggesting to East that he try something else. As it was, West discarded a heart, and East continued clubs when on lead with the diamonds. As far as he was concerned, West could have held both black aces instead of his actual holding. Now it would have been necessary to clear the clubs before putting West in with the spade ace to cash his club winners.