Entries, Entries, Entries

K 9 3 2
5
A Q 7 4 3
Q 6 5
7 4 6
Q J 9 8 4 J 7 2
K 8 5 2 J 9 6
3 2 K J 10 9 8 4
A Q J 10 8 5
A K 6 3
10 Contract: 7 spades
A 7 Opening lead: 3 of clbs, 2 of dia

Can you make this hand? Without taking the diamond hook? After all, who wants to be down at trick one? So we're not going to take that hook. One made the grand slam, and one didn't, and the difference was declarer's paying attention, I guess you might say. Here's how one made it: Club to the ace, diamond to the ace, ruff a diamond with the 10, jack of spades to the king, ruff another diamond with the queen, 5 of spades to the 9, ruff with the 8, and whaddya know! There's that pesky king of diamonds. Declarer can now ruff a low heart in dummy (declarer actually cashed two top hearts sluffing a club), sluff a club on the Q of diamonds, ruff a club, ruff a heart.
The other declarer actually got a diamond lead. Now if he'd just ruffed one diamond, he'd be half way home. Well, 40% of the way there, if you will, since he must take five diamond leads (ruffing 3). But he led a heart to the ace at trick two. Hm-m-m. Well, he's not dead yet, even though he squandered an entry -- but worse is that declarer is giving indications that he doesn't have his eye on the ball, since at this point, with a finesse no longer possible, ruffing out the diamonds on a 4-3 split is his only hope. Do not cash out established, always accessible winners without a good reason until you've finished housekeeping . Sometimes they'll be a stopper, sometimes they'll be a good entry, sometimes on unbalanced suits, you discard a valuable card from your other hand. Here, there's no earthly reason to cash the ace of hearts. You don't even want to be in that hand! Your task is to establish a 13th winner, and once the diamond finesse is declined, the only possibility is ruffing out the king of diamonds. You must keep your eye on that potential and set about establishing it.
Now declarer ruffed a heart, ruffed a diamond (with the five), ruffed a heart, ruffed a diamond (with the 8)-- well, it looks as though he's picked up on that possibility after all, except that -- well, you've probably spotted his difficulty. Ten of spades to the king, ruff a diamond with the jack, and sonuvagun, but there comes that pesky king of diamonds. The only problem is that he can't use it. He can't get to dummy except by, well, ruffing the king of hearts! He has no trump lower than the nine!
Declarer had four trump entries to dummy (after squandering the ace of diamonds entry). Two high cards and two ruffs. Since you've got to draw trump (and not so incidentally, learn if they're splitting 2-1 or 3-0), that should be first. You've always got the heart ruffs coming. You don't want to squander them early. You must draw two rounds of trump and count on two entries by way of heart ruffs. If declarer sees that way to conserve his entries, wherein he now has just enough, we might hope that one trump lead would be an honor to the king, or perhaps the situation might be worded this way: all diamond ruffs are to be high, the 8 and 5 being used for entries back to dummy.