Great bridge needs work — in the bidding, the best pairs spend hours practising their system, and in the declarer play and defence the best players try and learn from each hand they meet, and try to repeat the successes and avoid repeating the mistakes.

North-South on today’s hand had clearly done all of the above.

The bidding was just great, a smoothly oiled machine between two good players. After North opened, East made a pre-emptive jump overcall and South bid a natural, forcing three spades.

As he had a great hand for spades, North cue bid his Ace of hearts, and South enquired about key cards at his next turn. After North admitted to one such card, South asked about the Queen of spades with five hearts.

North’s six of clubs promised both the King of clubs and the sought-after Queen. Just a beautiful sequence which one needs to savour before getting on to the play.

West led the two of hearts, an obvious singleton. Declarer counted 11 winners when dummy appeared. A superficial view might deduce that the contract depended on the diamond finesse.

However, with the heart Queen in his hand, declarer found a plan that would make 12 tricks as long as trumps were not 4-0. Declarer won the first trick with the Ace of hearts and drew two rounds of trumps with his Ace and dummy’s Queen.

As the hearts were marked as 1-7, and East had followed to the first trump, he had at most five cards in the minors — so, declarer cashed the King and Queen of clubs. After a trump to his King to draw West’s remaining trump, declarer cashed the Ace of clubs and threw a heart from dummy.

This was now the position:

Now, declarer led the Queen of hearts from hand. East took this with the King and was end-played with only red-suit cards left. A diamond exit would give declarer three tricks in the suit and his contract.

The alternative of a heart was just as bad for the defence: declarer would throw a low diamond from hand and make his twelfth trick by ruffing that exit in dummy.

A marvellous display of bridge by North-South from start to finish!

• David Ezekiel can be reached on davidezekiel999@gmail.com

BRIDGE CLUB RESULTS

Friday, October 30

North/South

1 John Burville/Molly Taussig

2 Stephen Cosham/Margaret Way

3 Richard Hall/Magda Farag

East/West

1 Tony Saunders/Patricia Siddle

2 Gertrude Barker/Martha Ferguson

3 Charles Hall/John Rayner

Monday, November 2

North/South

1 Peter Donnellan/William Pollett

2 Elysa Burland/Molly Taussig

3 Geoff Bell/Kathleen Bell

East/West

1 Lorna Anderson/Heather Woolf

2 Patricia Siddle/Diana Diel

3 Wenda Krup/Gertrude Barker

Tuesday, November 3

North/South

1 Kim Simmons/Jean Schilling

2 Barbara Harington/Eldon Lewis

3 Tracy Pitt/David Leach

East/West

1 Ross Cooper/Desiree Woods

2 Joshimar Hussey/Julia Tadman

3 Amanda Ingham/John Thorne

Wednesday, November 4

North/South

1 Elizabeth McKee/Stephanie Kyme

2 Richard Gray/Wendy Gray

East/West

1 Linda Pollett/William Pollett

2 Patricia Siddle/Diana Diel

Thursday, November 5

1 Gertrude Barker/John F W Glynn

2 Jean Schilling/David Leach

3 Robert Mulderig/James Mulderig