| West | North | East | South |
| 1♣ | |||
| 1♥ | Dbl | Pass | 2♠ |
| 3♥ | 4♠ | All Pass |
Against your 4♠ contract, West leads the ♥K. Do you have a plan idea for getting to 10 tricks?
After the opening lead was tabled, declarer saw that to have any chance at his contract, he needed to limit his black-suit losers to one. For starters, he needed spades to be 3-2 and either a doubleton ♠Q or the ♣K onside. So, after winning the first trick with the ♥A declarer led a low club to West’s 9 and dummy’s jack. Once the latter held, declarer crossed back to hand with a trump to the ace to lead a second low club toward dummy. When the ♣K appeared, declarer won with the ace and played a low trump to his king, gratified to see that the suit had broken 3-2.
Declarer now had the contract in sight: he continued by ruffing a heart, then played a low club to his 10. After ruffing his remaining heart in dummy, declarer cashed the ♣Q, throwing a diamond from hand. Declarer had made nine tricks and as he had two diamonds and two trumps left, the defenders could score only two diamonds and a trump.
Note that it was essential to play two low clubs from hand on the first two rounds of the suit. If declarer had led the ♣10 at trick two, West would have covered it with the king, thereby restricting declarer to three club tricks, leaving him a trick short of his contract. The full deal: