It seems a pity that if both sides play a hand well, there must inevitably be a loser.  Nevertheless, the fact is that justice cannot always be served, since nobody has yet figured out how both sides can emerge victorious in a given hand.

Consider this deal where South was in four spades and West led the king of diamonds.  East saw little chance of defeating the contract unless he could get a club ruff, so he overtook the king with the ace and returned a club.  He was planning to win the first trump lead with the ace and put his partner on lead with a diamond in order to get a club ruff.

The meaning of East's first two plays was not lost on South.  Recognizing the danger of leading a trump at trick three, declarer instead cashed the A-K of hearts and continued with the deuce.  But rather than ruff the deuce, South discarded the jack of diamonds from dummy!

Superficially, this play simply swapped a diamond loser for a heart loser, but it actually did a lot more than that.  East unexpectedly found himself the unhappy winner of a heart trick, and his well-conceived plan of defence came to naught.

East should perhaps gotten a Croix de Guerre for his effort, but as it was, all he had to show for it was a loss of 620 points.  Ironically, he would have achieved the same result had he simply signaled with a high diamond at trick one, as a less-imaginative player might have done.  But in that case, the challenge of the deal for both sides would never have materialized.

Source: Steve Becker, Globe and Mail, August 6, 2024