| West | North | East | South |
| 2♣ | |||
| Pass | 3♣ | Pass | 3♠ |
| Pass | 5♠ | Pass | 6♠ |
| All Pass |
This deal was played at the 2004 European Championships in Malmo, Sweden, by the Faroe Islands’ Hedin Mouritzen, who executed a rare stepping-stone endplay. It was reported by Svend Novrup.
These are difficult hands to bid, and you might not consider 6♠ to be the top spot, but it’s hard to argue with a slam that makes.
West, expecting to see the ♣A Q in dummy, got off to the tricky lead of the ♣10. Declarer won the ♣A in dummy and embarked on his voyage to 12 tricks: diamond to the queen, heart ruff, diamond to the ace, heart ruff, club ruff, ♠A, ♠K and ♠J, followed by ♥A (hoping for the king to drop).
When the ♥K did not appear, South had to play for the stepping-stone in this position:
West was put on lead with the ♠10 as declarer discarded the ♣J from dummy. When West
got out with the ♦6, Mouritzen inserted dummy’s ♦10 to claim the unlikely slam.
Later, when questioned about how he knew to finesse in diamonds, Mouritzen had a prosaic
answer: “If West had held a non-diamond, he probably would have cashed it!”
The full deal: