This deal was played in a team game between your experienced team and one made up of less-experienced players. The auction shown is the one you and your partner had. The lead was the same at both tables: the ♥9. The less-experienced declarer took this with dummy’s queen and followed this by drawing the rest of the outstanding trumps with his ace and king. Next, he cashed dummy’s ♦A and ♦K. When the suit proved to be 4-1, declarer had to concede a trick to the defenders.
The more-experienced declarer played the first three tricks identically, but instead of tackling diamonds, he played two more rounds of trumps, discarding a diamond from dummy. It was only after cashing the ♠A and the ♣A and ♣K that he took the ♦A and ♦K. If the diamond suit had been 3-2, he would have cashed the ♦Q and ruffed a spade back to hand to take the last trick with a diamond. As East had kept two diamonds, there was no point in following that plan. Instead, declarer led the ♠8 from dummy and, since East had been forced to pitch three spades and two clubs on the trumps, his ♠K was now bare. Declarer ruffed away East’s ♠K and took the last two tricks with dummy’s ♦Q and ♠Q. The full deal:
