I’m sure that most people who turned out for the National Ladies and Mens Pairs enjoyed the experience. The Hotel was very pleasant, the company was convivial, and the hands were most entertaining.

Here’s a typical Pairs hand, where denying declarer an overtrick is worth lots of match points. As East, you hear this sequence from the opponents: 1ª – 1NT – 2NT – 3NT (dealer N, N/S Vulnerable). Partner leads © 6 (4^th best), and you see:

Declarer beats your © J with © K, and leads ¨ 2 to ¨ 10, ¨ Q and ¨ K. Given that partner is showing count, what do you lead now?

Thanks to partner’s brave play of ¨ 10 (which could cost on a bad day), you can be sure declarer now has 5 diamonds to cash. If you place partner with © A, then declarer will almost certainly have ª A for his bid. Therefore a heart return gives declarer 11 tricks (3 spades, 2 hearts, 5 diamonds and § A). You must return § K, limiting declarer to 10 tricks. As it happens, declarer holds:

Returning § K holds declarer to 9 tricks, for a very good score.

This next hand was also a little testing for the defence, and for declarer. My partner (South – his name is Stuart) led © K against 1NT after the following auction:

Declarer held up his Ace until the third round of hearts (partner playing K, Q, J), and discarded a diamond from dummy. Now he takes the Spade finesse, returns to hand with a diamond to the Queen, and repeats the spade finesse to reach this position:

Declarer did indeed cash ¨ A and lead a small club, to which I must play small. Now, because the hand is so obviously hopeless, he failed to play § J! Thus he went one down.

And, tired after playing 60 hands in the last 24 hours, who can blame him?

(Actually, his partner did have something to say about it.)

Declarer made a similar slip on this next hand.

With N/S Vulnerable and South as dealer, the bidding goes:

My partner leads ¨ 8. I win this with the King, and have a good long think. "If ¨ 8 is a singleton, then we can beat this straight away with a diamond ruff. But do I really want to put all my eggs in that basket? Partner must have § K and © Q for his (vulnerable) bid, in which case I should knock out § A before the diamonds are established, and use © Q as an entry to partner’s hand." Confidently, I lead § Q at trick 2.

When declarer wins this in hand with § K, some of this confidence disappears. "Oh! - partner must have ª A", I think. Then declarer leads a spade to the King, and partner fails to play his Ace. "That’s not very good defence partner". As you can see, I am a very slow learner.

Fortunately, the clubs aren’t running, so declarer needs a heart ruff. He leads the heart from table, and I play © 8 – now looking forward to my club ruff. Declarer plays small! (turning +690 into –100), but then partner goes into a trance. He is trying to read something clever into my © 8 (I was only showing count partner!), and wondering whether I really want him to be on lead.

"PLEASE TAKE THIS TRICK PARTNER!", reverberated around my brain.

After about 3 weeks, he decides to win the trick and give me a club ruff, for one down (once I cash ¨ A). Declarer faces his hand at the end, and there is the Queen of Hearts…. Stuart and I both went a little pale.

A better line for declarer is to cash two trumps (say ª J and ª K), and then lead a diamond. This works as long as North has at most 2 trumps (or 3 trumps with Ace and King of hearts, of course).

Where was our bidding wrong? Probably my final bid should be 5© rather than double. I can’t criticise partner’s 2© bid, since 4© is cold (and how else will we reach it?). Also, it is difficult for Stuart to pull the final double given my initial take-out double of 1§ , since I might have good spades.

It’s frustrating when you can’t blame partner, isn’t it?

Finally, a hand for those people who complain about the cards they are dealt. You hold:

ª J 9 5 © 5 ¨ 10 9 8 6 4 § K 8 6 5.

Feeling bored? Well wake up, because you are about to make a grand slam (with a little help from dummy).

The full hand is:

With North as dealer, and E/W vulnerable, the auction goes:

After the hand, partner was unusually polite: "That was very clever of you to bid 6¨ on the way to 7 - in order to tempt their double." Or was he being sarcastic?