Last Gasp


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

You've got to account for every card in one hand or the other. Do not count heart losers from the open hand, club losers from the closed, as declarers have been known to do. You'll probably wind up with 11 tricks and wonder why when all you had to lose was a trump trick. Here the hand counts out very easily from the closed hand. As for diamonds, you've either got a 3-2 split or you don't, and there's no fancy handling that'll let you avoid two losers if the suit splits 4-1. You can only console yourself with the remembrance that if the suit splits badly for you, it does so for everybody. Clubs are cool, with an extra honor, which we'll make use of. Spades are solid and offer communication, so don't touch them unless you must. Which leaves hearts.
Well, we have three little ones, three potential losers we must take care of. One will go on the K of clubs, so we need only ruff two hearts in dummy. Hence: Win the spade lead in dummy, come to the ace of hearts, ruff a heart, diamond to the ace, ruff a heart, cash the K of diamonds. When everyone follows to the second round of diamonds, you're virtually home free. Only an improbable club void with the last diamond would allow that defender to ruff the first round of the suit and cash a heart. But it wasn't to be. Declarer only needed to cash two clubs, sluffing the last heart in the closed hand, and he will be home free, running his spades until the hand with the last diamond ruffs in. Declarer would then be on claim.
Here's how one declarer went down. He took the opening spade lead in the closed hand, led a low diamond and ducked!, letting West hold the trick. Not a wise idea. Now if you draw trump, you're only going to have one trump to ruff hearts, and if you try to ruff two hearts before drawing trump, you're going to have communication problems with East's diamonds posing a threat throughout. You can see that declarer can't use spades for an entry after ruffing a heart, or can use spades once only by overtaking the Q, a profligacy he cannot afford, nor can he use a diamond, since they're all busy now (two for ruffs and the K for drawing trump). Indeed, declarer didn't even try.
He drew the remaining trump and now can ruff only one heart. He cashed the A of spades, then the top clubs, sluffing a heart, ruffed a club, cashed the ace of hearts and K of spades and he seemed to be on a roll. Now the 8 of hearts was ruffed, and a club was led, losing to the queen. Down one.

Three were down in 6 no. I have several times referred to this situation, where I have argued that with a balanced fit, you'll probably, not necessarily, be better off in a trump contract. You'll almost surely get at least one more trick with a balanced fit in naming it trump than you will in no trump. That, of course, wouldn't hold if you're loaded for bear in high cards. If there's no strong indication that this is so, I'd recommend the suit contract.

I might point out for what it's worth that the hand counts out just about as easily from the North hand. Now you don't worry about hearts. You've got a singleton opposite the ace. Spades are still solid, offering one sluff of a club and you still need the even break in diamonds which you can do nothing about. Hence, on the opening spade lead, you would cash the ace of clubs and ruff a club, back with the K of diamonds and ruff a club, cash the A of diamonds and with the even split, you're virtually on claim. Go to the second spade honor in dummy and you can cash clubs (since they're splitting 4-3) and let East ruff in when he feels like it. In that scenario, you have two trump left in dummy and access to your remaining winners whenever East ruffs in.