South	West	North	East
1	Pass	2	Pass
2	Pass	3	Pass
3NT	Pass	6NT	Pass
Pass	Pass

The Cheadle Hulme club has recently introduced using duplimated boards.  This is good in that players get a record of the deals played and, even more importantly, the deals tend to be much more interesting than hand dealt boards.  On Monday 14th March there were seven potential slam deals in thirty boards, four of which were good slams, one about fifty percent and the other two poor, but making on the lie of the cards.

On the deal above this was our auction to the wrong slam.  Six diamonds is a good place to play, six notrump is directly off on an unlikely spade lead.  On the actual diamond lead to the ace and club return, declarer cashed the spade ace, unblocked the high diamonds, crossed to the heart ace and ran the diamonds.  One defender held the long hearts and clubs and was squeezed for a rather fortunate joint top for North-South.  Other squeezes also work; for example if East has the spade king and length in hearts or clubs.

Reaching six diamonds is quite difficult once North has responded two clubs, which is a reasonable bid given the great disparity between the minor suit strengths.