Recently, I was in attendance when the following hand was played by the declarer like a novice. Actually, most novices would have played it right.
S A x
H A x x x
D K J x x
C K x x
S x
H K Q T x
D x
C A Q J x x x x
The pair reached an excellent small slam in hearts, and were lucky in that a diamond was not lead. The declarer was so fixated on other things that after pulling 3 rounds of trump and finding that hearts split 3/2 he pulled a 4th round "just to make sure". It was only then, after this careless, boneheaded play, that he realized he could have made all the tricks by pitching 4 diamonds on the clubs, and ruffing a diamond in his hand.
Thus, he would have made 5 heart tricks, a spade and 7 clubs!
He failed to realize (in time) that he could pitch ALL his diamonds on the 4th, 5th, 6th and 7th club.
If he has any excuse at all (he really doesn't), he was thinking, as he usually does, that a 6 no trump contract was ice cold, from his side of the table. In addition to reminding us that often a suit contract yields more tricks than no trump (as it would have in this case, absent a diamond lead) we should remember to play carefully and count our tricks, before making a rash play like the one that cost our hapless hero a board which would have tied for top on the hand.
By the way, did I mention that the unhappy protagonist who is the subject of this column is named Al Pagan?