Bridge

In a perfectly reasonable slam (if you look at just the North- South cards), South escaped what would have been a killing spade lead. But it turned out he still had a lot of work to do when the bad trump break came to light.

South opened 12, North bid 1# and South rebid 1!. Now North launched out with 24, intended as a splinter, showing a spade shortage and agreeing hearts as trumps, but South misunderstood and raised (rather wildly) to 44. To avoid further confusion, North bid a firm 6! and, after what to his partner must have been an agonising trance, South finally passed.

Well, would you have led a spade on this bidding? No; perhaps not surprisingly, West chose the #10. It still looked easy to South, but the ace and king of hearts revealed the bad trump break. It was now necessary to take a winning position in clubs in order to discard dummy's losing spade. After studying the entry position carefully, South got it right when he led a low club and finessed dummy's 10. When this won he cashed 2K, ruffed a diamond in hand, and threw the losing spade on the 2A. Now it was all over; there was just a trump trick to be lost.

Why did South get the clubs right? Suppose that he plays East rather than West for the missing queen. After a club to the king and the 210 - which East presumably covers with his hypothetical queen - declarer would now be short of sufficient entries to dummy to ruff a diamond (establishing the suit) and get the lead back on the table. He would then be left relying on an odds-against 3-3 division in diamonds.