In today's deal from last year's Yeh Cup in Wuxi, China, three hearts looks to be high enough. But Agustin Madala bid game and received a diamond lead to the king, a spade shift to the ace, and a second diamond. He rose with the ace, pitched his diamond loser on the top spade, then finessed the heart jack, noting West's seven. Now he played a club, ruffed a diamond as East threw a club, took a second top club, and played dummy's top spade to pitch his last club.

Next came a second diamond ruff as East pitched his last spade, and since the defenders’ only plain-suit cards were spades, declarer could safely exit with the heart jack, knowing that if East won and had a spade to lead, declarer would be able to ruff low and not be overruffed. As the cards lay, East won and played back a heart, letting Madala finesse and claim his contract.

East had only one chance to make declarer’s life harder. When the fourth diamond was led from dummy, ruffing low would have given up any hope of getting a second trump trick. But might East have given declarer a losing option by ruffing high?

Declarer has to overruff, then has to read whether to exit with a high trump or a low one, depending on whether the remaining heart honor is bare or the nine is falling. I think declarer should get this right; if West has false-carded with the trump seven from 9-7-x, good luck to him.

Yaniv Zack of Israel reached four hearts in today’s 2011 Yeh Brothers Cup deal. West led the club queen, ducked all around, then helpfully shifted to a spade to the king, ducked, followed by a spade to declarer’s ace. Now Zack passed the heart 10 successfully. He repeated the heart finesse, took the diamond finesse, cashed the diamond ace and queen, and crossruffed with his remaining trumps. He ended up taking six trump tricks, three diamond tricks and the spade ace. Had West covered the heart 10 with the queen at trick four, the crossruff fails. But there is a route to success — though I would take my hat off to anyone who found it!

When in dummy at trick four, lead a diamond. If East plays low, you put in the jack, draw a second round of trumps with the jack, and play a second diamond, ducking East’s king! East is endplayed, forced to lead a club, and you now have an extra winner and just enough entries to unscramble them. Equally elegant, if East puts up the diamond king on the first round to avoid this endplay, you win, cash the heart jack, ruff a club, take the heart king, and lead a diamond to the queen.

In the four-card ending, dummy has a card in each suit, while you hold two spades and two diamonds. You lead the club king and pitch a spade, forcing East to win and return a club, exercising a suicide squeeze on his partner as you pitch a second spade.

When China ZH and Indonesia met in the first phase of the Yeh Brothers Cup, both were on the cusp of qualifying for the top group; but one bad match by either could drop that team into the Swiss. This deal cost the Chinese dearly.

In one room the Chinese East came in over a no-trump opening to show the minors and bought an exceptionally poor dummy in three clubs doubled. Though he was allowed to escape for down two, minus 300 was not a great score.

In the room shown, declarer, Zhuang Zejun, received a diamond lead and ducked it to the queen. Back came a club won in dummy. Declarer led with a low trump to the queen and ace, then played a heart to the nine and East’s king. When a second club came back, declarer won in hand and played a third club, planning to pitch a diamond and crossruff. However, West ruffed in, leaving declarer with an inevitable trump and diamond loser.

Had declarer run the heart eight, covered by West, before playing the club, he would have been much better placed. He leads out the spade jack, then the 10, which West must duck, or declarer can draw trump, cash the club winner, then take the heart finesse.

When both trumps are ducked, declarer changes tack and plays the diamond ace, ruffs a heart to hand, and leads the club queen to pitch dummy’s diamond, leaving West with just his master trump.

In today's deal from last year's Yeh Brothers Cup, the point was made that one should not pull a takeout double from fear alone. Particularly if both sides are vulnerable, the benefit of going plus may almost equal the cost of letting a doubled partscore make. If a few doubled contracts do not make, you probably are not doubling enough.

That said, the pain when you double the opponents into game and don’t defend accurately may be the critical factor that suggests caution in this area. And the following deal exhibits that theme nicely.

After Huub Bertens’ double of three clubs, Jack Zhao judged well not to run to three hearts. At this vulnerability he must have figured that he had every chance of a decent penalty. Right he was … in a sense.

The defenders cashed two spades and two diamonds, leaving West on play. At this point West was tempted to lead a high diamond to let East discard, but that turned out to be fatal. Either major suit would work to disrupt declarer’s entries and to prevent declarer from shortening himself.

On West’s top diamond play, East threw a spade, and declarer, Frankie Karwur, ruffed in hand, overtook a heart to run the club jack and 10 as East ducked. Then he ruffed another diamond to hand and went back to a top heart. With the lead in dummy he could score his club ace and queen, whatever the defense did.

After you have been knocked out of the main event, will a Swiss Teams offer any consolation? Maybe yes, if the right deal comes along. Put yourself in East's seat, defending against six spades, which was played in last year's Yeh Brothers Cup.

When dummy comes down on partner’s lead of the diamond three, it would be easy to relax after winning the diamond ace and returning a low diamond.

Declarer ruffs high and starts to run six of his seven remaining trumps. Your partner, who began with hearts solid from the king down, discards one at every turn, while dummy discards diamonds, as do you.

In the six-card ending, you have kept two hearts, a diamond and three clubs to match dummy. On the penultimate trump, when dummy throws a club, what will you discard?

At the table Subhash Gupta’s opponent discarded a heart — and that was fatal. If you pitch a heart you leave partner controlling the hearts, so dummy’s second heart becomes a threat. Therefore when declarer cashes the heart ace and leads his last trump, West must keep one heart and thus come down to two clubs. Dummy pitches its last heart and you are squeezed between diamonds and clubs. If you had pitched a club earlier and kept your heart guard, your partner could have kept his clubs and pitched his hearts, leaving the suit to you. On the last trump, dummy must relinquish a guard in front of you, and you come under no further pressure.

Today's declarer in six spades was entitled to claim he was unlucky. He ruffed the opening lead of a club and led a high trump from hand. The 5-0 trump break made him open his eyes wide. He switched his attention to diamonds, hoping three rounds might stand up if East had the length. No luck there: East ruffed the third diamond and exited with a heart. Declarer still thought he might come close to making his contract if the heart finesse succeeded, but when it lost, he was struggling to escape for down one.

The swing on this deal was especially expensive since his opponents had stayed out of slam in the other room. Can you see what declarer might have done, even against the foul trump break?

It is a lot easier to see when you are looking at all four hands, but if your objective is to take 12 tricks rather than 13, surely the only thing you have to worry about is a bad trump break. It then makes a lot of sense to duck the first trick, discarding a heart from hand rather than ruffing in.

West does best to shift to a diamond, which you win in hand to lead a spade to the board. Now when West discards, you lead a spade back to the 10, cross to a top diamond, and play a spade to the nine. After drawing trump, you have 12 tricks: a club, a heart and five winners in each of the other suits.

When Poland defeated the U.S, squad in the Mindsports Olympiad four years ago, this was one of the bright spots for America.

In one room Jeff Meckstroth played three no-trump after opening one no-trump, hearing a transfer to spades, and then being offered a choice of games.

Meckstroth put up dummy’s heart king on the low-heart lead, played a club to hand and a spade to the queen, which held. He then cashed the clubs, noting the discard of a spade and a diamond from West. Then came the spade ace, the king dropping from West, who was next thrown in with a heart to be endplayed in diamonds. In the two-card ending, Meckstroth put up the diamond queen when West led the suit and made his game.

In the closed room the auction went as shown, with West’s overcall having indicated at least five hearts.

The attack was a low heart, which declarer, Krzysztof Martens, won in hand and continued with all four club tricks. Bob Hamman, appreciating what would happen in the endgame, made the thoughtful discards of two low diamonds, baring his king. Martens continued with the spade jack, covered by the king and ace. Next came the spade queen, and Martens, like Meckstroth, exited with a heart, expecting that Hamman would then be endplayed in diamonds. But after cashing his hearts, Hamman produced the spade nine: one down.

In today's deal you could argue that West might have bid four spades over four hearts, but West was not sure at this vulnerability what the size of the penalty might be. As it was, he passed, and North bid five hearts as a general try, focusing on spades more than anything else. South looked at his quick tricks and accepted the invitation. In this position one should pass with no control, and cue-bid five spades with the ace and anything but a dead minimum. You can use your discretion with a second-round control, typically bidding slam unless you are otherwise unsuitable.

Against six hearts, when the spade three was led to the jack and 10, East insulted declarer by trying to cash the spade ace, perhaps not seeing the downside of this move.

South was quick to put him right. He ruffed the second spade high, and now it was an easy matter to cross to dummy with a trump and lead the spade queen to pin the nine and establish the eight for a discard.

Of course if the spade nine had not fallen, declarer would have been reduced to taking the club finesse for his contract, and today would not have been his lucky day.

Had the spade nine and eight been switched, declarer could have husbanded the entries to dummy and have brought about this position for himself without any help from the defenders after the opening lead.

An avoidance play is declarer's attempt to deny one opponent the lead. This could be because we fear a shift from one opponent but not the other, or equally, as in today's deal, one opponent has winners to cash.

Look at the play today in three no-trump, remembering that your target is to take nine tricks, not 10!

West obediently leads a spade. As declarer, you must duck the first two spades to cut the defenders’ communications. You win the third spade and should work out that you only need four diamond tricks for the contract, but you must keep East off play if he has four diamonds. To do that, you do not mind investing an overtrick.

You cross to dummy by leading a low heart to the 10. Now comes a diamond toward your hand. If East plays low, you insert the eight and have achieved your target of bringing in the diamond suit safely.

If East divines your intention and inserts the 10 on the first diamond, you take the trick in hand and lead a heart to the queen. Then you repeat the process in diamonds, planning again to lead low to your eight, finessing against East’s jack. This insures that you make nine tricks, since if West has a second diamond, the suit must be splitting for you, and you can overtake your remaining diamond honor with the ace and run the suit.