Today's hand was nicely handled by declarer in a recent European Women's Championship.

After a normal if slightly aggressive action to reach the 24-point three no-trump, West gave declarer an assist when she led a low spade to the queen. Even after that start, at first sight there does not seem too much straw with which to make bricks. Declarer played off the ace and king of hearts without much hope, but when the queen fell from West, the distribution of that suit was apparent. Now came a club to the king and a low diamond to the queen, which held.

Things were really looking up now. South could count eight tricks, so she continued with a low diamond, ducked to East’s nine. When East returned the diamond jack, on which West shed a spade, the hand was an open book to declarer. East was known to have started with four hearts and four diamonds, and both from the bidding and East’s failure to return a spade, her shape was revealed as 1-4-4-4.

Declarer won the diamond return with the ace, cashed the club ace, then exited with a third club, knowing that whichever opponent won the trick would be endplayed.

If it was East, then after cashing a club and a diamond, she would have to lead a heart into dummy’s tenace. And if it was West, as happened at the table, she could cash the spade ace and king, but would then have to lead to declarer’s jack.

Today's deal from the old days was played by Dr John Fisher of Dallas, one of my great friends within the community of Texas bridge players. He won the McKenney trophy for the most masterpoints earned in a year in 1973, and was a great doctor as well s a bridge player. He was one of Barry Crane's regular partners, and together they formed a fearsome pair.

After a strong jump response, Fisher played four spades, but he had reached that contract in an informative auction that got West off to the best attack. The incisive lead of the diamond king saw East encourage and West continue with his second diamond. East won his ace, cashed the queen, then played a fourth diamond. Fisher ruffed high and cashed the spade ace and king.

When the spade 10 fell, he decided to play East for two trumps remaining. He took the heart ace and king; then the heart queen, which he ruffed in hand, the start of a grand coup.

The club queen to dummy’s king left a three-card ending where South had the Q-7 of spades and the club ace, while East had the 8-6 of spades and the 13th diamond. When Fisher led a winning heart from dummy, what could East do? If he ruffed in, declarer would overruff and draw trump. He chose to discard, so Fisher pitched his club ace and led another heart to achieve the trump coup at trick 12.

Today's deal comes from the finals of a national championship. How would you evaluate South's cards?

In one room South opened three hearts. West doubled, North raised to four hearts, and South fell from grace by bidding on to five hearts over East’s four-spade bid. It is better for South to double here to show extra shape, wanting to bid again, though North might well have got it wrong and bid five hearts himself, but then it would have been his fault! The defenders cashed out for 300.

In the other room Ishmael Del’Monte opened four hearts, doubled by West to end the auction. (Most play this double nowadays to be closer to takeout than optional, but maybe the fact that West was a rubber-bridge expert made his double more inclined to penalties.)

West led the spade king to get a count card of the five, and continued with the ace — the queen might have been clearer. East followed with the three, leaving West to guess if this was suit-preference for clubs from an original holding of four spades, or an original doubleton spade.

Either way, though, how could cashing the diamond ace next have been wrong? If partner discourages, you revert to spades and wait for your club tricks if any. In fact, West played a third spade and declarer trumped, then ruffed out the clubs via the trump finesse. He ended up with three clubs and seven hearts, for 590.

In today's deal North's raise of four spades to five specifically suggested concern about the opponent's suit. If North had weak trumps and a club control, he could have advanced with five clubs, so the actual sequence asked South to pass with no club control, cue-bid the ace, or bid slam with second-round control.

Now to the play. When the board occurred in a team game both tables relied on the heart king falling early or on diamonds breaking. The declarers drew trump and tried to ruff out the heart king, falling back on the diamond break when nothing nice developed. Both tables ended up with 11 tricks, and both were unaware that they had failed to exploit their chances properly.

Better technique is to ruff the second club, draw trump, then cash the heart ace, cross to dummy with a trump, cash the diamond ace, ruff a heart, then run all but one of the trumps. In the four-card ending, dummy has two hearts and the diamond king-queen. In hand you have three diamonds and one trump left; but which four cards does East keep? If he reduces to two hearts and two diamonds, you will unblock diamonds, ruff a heart to hand, and take trick 13 with a diamond.

If instead he keeps one heart and three diamonds, you will know the diamonds are not splitting when West shows out. Your one remaining chance is to ruff a heart to hand; with the heart king falling, dummy is now good.

When both sides have a good fit and the bidding gets high quickly, it is always hard to judge who can make what. It is often a sound principle to keep on bidding when in doubt. Maybe you can make your contract, or maybe it is a good sacrifice. That was why North tried five diamonds over four hearts.

Declarer ruffed the heart lead, crossed to hand with a club, then ruffed another heart. However, the pace of play now slowed down and declarer was short of winning options. In practice he played a low spade, but East went in with the king and switched to a trump.

Declarer ran this to dummy but now, with the spade suit blocked, the best he could do was cash the spade ace and jack, discarding a heart. In the end he had to lose a trump and a club to go with the spade already lost.

Although it looked tempting to play to ruff hearts in dummy immediately, declarer should have foreseen that this line might not work against a bad trump break. Look at the effect of playing a spade at trick two.

Say that East goes in with the king, as before, and plays a trump. Declarer runs this to dummy, plays a spade to the queen, ruffs another heart, and cashes the spade ace while discarding a heart, then plays the spade jack. Whether East ruffs in or discards, declarer loses just one more trick.

Declarer looked beyond the obvious when playing this heart slam. Unfortunately, he did not look far enough, and the slam failed.

Declarer appreciated that the obvious route to 12 tricks was to find the club king with East, and dummy’s trumps provided the necessary two entries to repeat the finesse. But South saw another possibility — that he could give up a diamond trick in exchange for generating two extra winners — in which case he would not need the club finesse at all, since there would then be two discards for the queen and jack of clubs.

For this to be so, the most likely lie of the diamonds would be the king in West’s hand, with the jack due to fall in three rounds. So, declarer cashed the heart ace, then followed with ace and another diamond. West took the king, and when the jack dropped doubleton from East, followed with a third diamond. East ruffed and South overruffed, but now only one club discard was available. With the club king offside, down went the slam.

Declarer was on the right track, but failed to allow for the diamond jack being doubleton with East. The way home is, at trick three, to lead the diamond seven toward the queen — without first cashing the ace. West cannot afford to duck, but now a diamond return can do no harm. After South draws trump ending in dummy, both of his losing clubs can be offloaded on dummy’s good diamonds.

Few historical characters play much of a role in the naming of bridge coups, though the Deschapelles Coup is named after a famous whist player, and the Merrimac Coup is named after a historical event.

Cardinal Morton’s role in history is relatively minor. As Henry VII’s grasping cardinal, he impaled England’s peers on the horns of a dilemma. Either they entertained him well — in which case they were wealthy — or they tried to look poor, in which case their thrift also implied funds in the bank. Either way, they had to pay heavy taxes to the king.

Here is a Morton’s Fork coup. In four hearts West leads a top club and shifts to a trump. You win cheaply in hand and play a second club. West wins and exits in trumps, letting you take both red aces and the club queen, then cross to hand with a trump.

When you lead a spade toward the king, it presents West with a Morton’s Fork. If West takes this, he provides a home for your diamond loser, so he must duck the trick. You win dummy’s king, and now cash your last two trumps, reducing to a three-card end position. If you judge that West has reduced to a single diamond, you cash the diamond king and score your diamond jack. If West keeps two diamonds, he must come down to a bare spade ace. You exit in spades and wait for him to play a diamond around to your jack.

Deals from actual play are somehow more satisfying than constructed deals. No one has rung a bell to let the player know that the critical moment has come and that he must focus on the problem at hand before it is too late.

The deal came up on OK Bridge and the auction shown was typical. After South took a punt at three no-trump, the defenders led a heart to the ace and returned the heart eight to West’s jack. West saw that the missing hearts were the nine and queen, and since East would have returned the nine had he been left with the 9-8 at trick two, South must logically hold both of those cards. A shift was logically called for, and West had the choice of playing his partner for the club ace or any two spade honors. Most guessed well by playing a spade. (On a club shift declarer would be likely to succeed by ducking the trick.)

But at our featured table, declarer, Tim Bourke, could see this scenario about to present itself to West. To prevent him from finding the winning play, Tim cold-bloodedly sacrificed the heart nine under East’s eight at trick two!

Now there were no inferences available about the small hearts. From West’s perspective he needed to cash the hearts immediately or declarer might be able to scamper home with nine tricks. (Give declarer any one of East’s black-suit honors, and that would be true.) So he cashed the heart king and set up Tim’s ninth winner for him.

After South's strong no-trump, West came in with two hearts and North showed four spades and no heart stop by cue-bidding three hearts. (Had he held a heart stopper and four spades, a convention called Lebensohl would have let him bid two no-trump as a puppet to three clubs, then cue-bid three hearts.)

The final contract of three no-trump was predictable enough, and West equally predictably led a top heart.

Before you play to the first trick, it is always a good idea to count your winners and decide where you need to set up tricks and who is the danger hand. A cursory count of potential winners should come to eight. If clubs split, you have nine tricks, so you need to allow for the likelihood that they will not break.

The secret here is that the hearts are useless to you, and the diamond king is worth nothing if the ace is onside. If that is so, West will have heart winners galore, ready to cash. So you must hope the diamond ace is offside!

Win the heart lead for fear of the diamond shift, unblock your spade honors, then cross to a top club and cash the spade jack. Now take your club winners, ending in dummy. If the fourth club is not a winner, exit with the club loser and wait for East to lead a diamond. With any luck, the diamond ace will be offside, and East will be endplayed to lead around to dummy’s diamond king.