At trick one dummy turns up with a singleton Club and partner is following suit with the NINE. What does this mean ? There is no point in encouraging at this stage with a singleton in dummy and there is also little point in showing the count. Partner is, in fact, telling you what to play next. His Club Nine is a SUIT PREFERENCE SIGNAL asking you to switch to  the   higher of the two remaining suits (barring trumps). Therefore partner is asking you to switch to the Heart suit. You duly switch to a Heart and this enables you to establish a third defensive trick before declarer has had a chance to force out partner’s Diamond Ace.

Now the defence will take 1 Club, 1 Diamond and 1 Heart.

NB Without Suit preference signals, perhaps West will see the potential of dummy’s Diamonds and still take his only chance and switch to a Heart, but Suit Preference signals make life so much easier for the defence in clarifying the Heart switch..

You can also watch the following movie to see how the hand pans out. To view this programme you will need  to download htttp://www.haroldschogger.com/bridgevu.setup

  alternatively watch the film www.haroldschogger.com/movies2.htm

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