This hand is from a Gold Cup match against Pat Collins, Derek Patterson, and the Tredinnick twins (who have reached the final of the Gold Cup three times in the last five years).

Mr Timid was sitting North and opened with a pass, Mr Bountiful was sitting South and bid 1C. Over a (weak) 2S from West, Mr Timid thought long and hard before bidding a thoughtless 5C. Poor Mr Bountiful - with a wonderful  hand, he had little idea whether a slam was now possible.

Silly Mr Timid - having decided to push on to 5C with his hand, a 4H bid from him (obviously a splinter) would have been so much more descriptive, and now 6C/7C would now surely have been found (Mr Bountiful needs little more than xxxx, x, xxx, AKxxx to make a Grand Slam a playable contract).

Collins/Patterson had no difficulty finding 6C+1 in the other room.

Here is a hand from the 2009 Brighton Swiss Pairs.

El Maestro (England International)  was sitting North and decided to be a wily old fox on the following hand, to great effect.

West starts by passing, El Maestro passes(!!) and Miss Demeanor(East) opens 1D followed by a pass from El Cliento (South), 1H from West, pass again from El Maestro(!!!!), 2C from Miss Demeanor, pass, pass, and now El Maestro finally enters the fray with a conservative 2S. Miss Demeanor bids 3C, pass, pass, and now El Maestro bids 3S, with the friendly comment, "Because spades are higher than clubs". Hmmmm....Miss Demeanor now realises that the aftershave aroma she detects at the table is one she doesn't much care for - "Eau de Trap" -  and decides to pass.

El Cliento now perks up and decides that his hand is looking rather good after all the bidding that El Maestro has done, so bids 4S. Pass, pass, and now Miss Demeanor finally succumbs to the allure of Eau de Trap by doubling.

Miss Demeanor leads the Ace of clubs (2C from West, reverse count showing 2 or 4), then cashes Ace of diamond hoping that West has a singleton, but reads West's 3D as either J3 doubleton, or J32 tripleton. As a last ditch attempt, Miss Demeanor plays JH (hoping that West has AQ), and West takes the JH with the Ace and plays back a heart, hoping that Miss Demeanor can ruff - El Maestro let's it run round to dummy.

El Maestro now has a complete count of Miss Demeanor's hand shape (1255) and notes that Miss Demeanor has only turned up with 9 points so far (not enough for a double, surely?), so knows where the KS is sitting, and knows that it is singleton. El Maestro now leads a spade from the table, and hums and haws, folds his cards and lays them on the table, looks to the ceiling for inspiration, all adding to the delightful dramatic effect (not lost for one second on El Cliento) and resignedly plays AS, felling the marked singleton KS to the delight of El Cliento. Contract made, and another happy client.

There is an old Chinese proverb that says, "third in hand, do not open unless the sum total of your points + number of spades = 15". Miss Demeanor wishes she had remembered that Old Chinese Proverb, as El Cliento is likely to pass 4th in hand with a balanced 10 count, vulnerable.

Things are much more interesting if Miss Demeanor leads JH at trick one - El Maestro has to show his true mettle (by rising with KH) to make  4S  - West takes AH, but can't safely continue the heart suit. If West then exits in a minor, all Miss Demeanor can do is pray that West has a singleton diamond - so cashes the minor suit aces and exits in diamonds. El Maestro will naturally be suspicious of being given a "free lunch" entry to dummy, so will shun the gift of an entry to dummy, and continue by dropping the singleton KS.

So best defence (if JH is lead at trick one, covered by AH) is probably a spade switch by West at trick 2, to put El Maestro to the test. El Maestro should still rise with the AS, and play a diamond to dummy, establishing KD for a discard of his losing heart. Eventually the 3S (overtaken by 8S) gives re-entry to dummy.

But all's well that ends well: Miss Demeanor eventually won the match 16-4.

It takes two thinking  players to make a real hash of a defence. Mano Verboard was sitting North, and Michael Scuebid was sitting South (names changed to protect the guilty parties). This is how the horror story unfolds...

North doubles Five clubs, and thinks of a lead. He doesn't like to underlead aces, so leads the Jack of clubs (to cut down on potential ruffs by declarer) to South's Ace of clubs.

South reasons that North has nothing in diamonds and clubs, and can't have Ace of spades, so leads King of hearts at trick two in case North has AJx in hearts.

North now reasons that South has the Queen of hearts, so North can score a heart ruff, or South will be able to score the Jack of hearts if he started with KQJ of hearts. So at trick two, North overtakes the King of hearts with the Ace, and leads back a low heart to South's supposed Queen.

A surprised West now wins the heart, draws trumps, cashes Jack of diamonds, enters dummy with the 10 of hearts,  throws spades on top diamonds, and ends up with eleven tricks.  

Result: EW +550 rather than -1100 (2 spades, 2 hearts, two heart ruffs and Ace of clubs). Five of NS's seven defensive tricks evaporated.

NS were last seen at the Queen Victoria Hospital in East Grinstead looking for an emergency humour transplant!