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Your support makes all the difference.All of the North-South pairs in the Macallan Invitational Pairs played in 4! on this deal. Despite the #K being offside and the 4-1 trump break, this still looks an easy contract but two of the eight declarers were steered into a losing line of play.
After the (unopposed) bidding of 1!-2! (forcing); 3#-3!; 4! by the Americans, Bob Hamman and Bobby Wolff, Chris Convery (South Africa) found the inspired lead of 22. Not unnaturally, declarer guessed wrong and was compelled to ruff the club return. Now when West won with his ace of hearts, he was able to force with 2A and so come to a second trump trick.
The other unsuccessful declarer was Franck Multon (France). Against him, Pat Davies who, partnered by Nicola Smith, was at this stage virtually assured of a highly-placed finish in the event, scorned the flashy underlead of 2A at trick one (which could have proved very costly) and pushed out a peaceful spade.
She did extremely well later, however, when she won the first round of trumps and switched to the low club (which now could hardly cost more than a possible overtrick) before declarer discovered that the hearts were 4-1. Possibly not expecting any danger ahead, South again misguessed, was forced on the club return and, again, eventually lost a second trump trick.
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