BRIDGE

If you wanted a layout for an intermediate-plus class on declarer play to illustrate the operation and benefits of elimination and endplay, this deal from an online match would be perfect.

North’s artificial response was a Bergen Raise, the “smaller” version to show about 7-10 high-card points and at least four-card support for Opener’s major.

That was enough encouragement for South to unleash Blackwood and locate his partner’s ace (1430 Keycard responses) before bidding the small slam.

Dummy provided a perfect fit that offered declarer two alternatives after winning the diamond lead and drawing trumps.

First possibility: South could try to guess which opponent to finesse for the Queen of clubs and coast home, this time with an overtrick, if he guessed right by playing West for the crucial Queen.

But there would be a serious cost to guessing wrong here as losing a trick to the club Queen would result in a fast down one after the defense cashed a diamond. And who always guesses the right way to go when faced with a two-way finesse?

Much better: After the same preliminaries as above, play spade ace, spade King and ruff the closed hand’s last spade. Finally, concede the diamond loser to whichever defender wants to win it. With spades and diamonds eliminated from the North-South hands, the defender who wins the diamond will be endplayed, forced to either locate the club Queen with an exit in that suit or give up a ruff and discard (trump in dummy while pitching the third club from South) by exiting with any suit but clubs.