SOUND ASLEEP AT THE BRIDGE TABLE

Anthony Burgess wrote, "Laugh and the world laughs with you. Snore and you sleep alone." Though, as Mark Twain pointed out, it is a mystery why snoring wakes everyone except the snorer.

It pays to stay wide awake at the bridge table. Also, don't play quickly if you think a critical moment has been reached. Even if it turns out that your pause helps declarer, it is better to take a timeout than to misdefend by playing impulsively.

In one match, a West played far too quickly on this deal from a European Team Championship.

North was right just to raise to three no-trump. It was unlikely that five diamonds would make and three no-trump would go down. Much more likely that the opposite would be true.

At the first table, the declarer won the first trick with his heart ace and immediately cashed his six diamond tricks. However, this allowed East to make an encouraging discard in clubs. That made it easy for West to win the first spade trick and switch to clubs, defeating the contract.

At the other table, Andrei Gromov did much better. He won the first trick and immediately led the spade five from his hand. After West played a sleepy low spade and dummy's queen held, South claimed his contract.

When declarer didn't lead a diamond at trick two, it marked him with that ace. Further, if West trusted his partner's discouraging signal at trick one, South also had the heart king. That made eight red-suit winners. So, South was presumably trying to sneak his ninth trick. West should have jumped in with the spade ace and switched to clubs, resulting in down three.