I sat South here and was allowed to make my contract on soft defense. Follow the play and judge where things went astray.
East’s two-diamond call was a lead-directing effort. I might have passed as South. Indeed, some would pass at the start with this sorry excuse for a 12-count, but I like to introduce a good six-card major when I have one. When I repeated my spades, I was hauled all the way to game.
West led a top club and switched to a trump. I overtook in hand with the spade queen to ruff a club. I then led a diamond from dummy. East stepped up with the king and played a third club. No good — I ruffed, drew the rest of the trumps and gave up a diamond. Dummy’s diamonds provided discards for my hearts, and the game came home.
East could have inferred West’s shape from the bidding. He was known to have at most two spades and had shown out in diamonds. If West had five hearts and six clubs, he would have mentioned hearts at some stage. Thus, a third club was not standing up, so East should have tried to establish a heart for the setting trick.
East can either continue with a low diamond for West to ruff, thus keeping the diamond ace to control the suit, or he can shift to hearts. The queen would be covered by the king and ace, removing my entry to dummy’s diamonds. No doubt my best bet at that stage would be to duck the heart king and hope for a 3-3 split (or for East to have four hearts and fall victim to a squeeze), but no dice here.