Dealer North. Both Vul

                                    ♠          —

                                    ♥          9 7 6 2

                                    ♦          9 8

                                    ♣         Q J 10 8 7 5 3

            ♠          K J 10 7                                  ♠          Q 8 6 4 2

            ♥          J 3                                           ♥          K 10 8 5

            ♦          K Q 7 6                                   ♦          10 5 4

            ♣         9 6 2                                       ♣         4

                                    ♠          A 9 5 3

                                    ♥          A Q 4

                                    ♦          A J 3 2

                                    ♣         A K

  This hand comes from a recent Hubert Phillips match and after a bizarre auction South ended up in 6§

After a long think I decided to lead a club.

Declarer won the first trick and played Ace of Diamonds chucking a Diamond loser and then played Ace and another Diamond trumping in dummy. He took a successful Heart finesse and then a second and third Heart. At this juncture knowing partner had the King I stupidly discarded  knowing partner was going to win. However declarer was now able to make his 12^th trick by ruffing the losing Heart in his hand with his Club Ace. He had made 7 clubs, 1 Spade, 1 Diamond 2 Hearts and 1 Heart ruffed in his hand, the short hand.

Why hasn’t declarer drawn my trumps?

Now lets rewind to the third round of Hearts. Even though I know partner has winning Heart I MUST RUFF and play my last trump so that declarer can not use his only trump left for ruffing the losing heart and in the end  partner will still make his Heart King. The defence will make 1 Heart ruffed and the King of Hearts if trumps are played at every opportunity by the defence.

You can also view  watch the following movie to see how the hand pans out. (You need bridgvu.exe programme  and it is available free from   http://www.haroldschogger.com/videos.html or BridgeBase programme on your machine already to view it )

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