Italian Bridge Federation coach Carlo Alberto Perroux has almost completed the formation of the national team. In numerous tournaments, Perroux recruited four young bridgists, with whom Chiaradia took turns training. Finally the day came when Perroux made his choice. It was decided by two boards.
 The first deal was the following:


The South opened with a strong 1 NT, the North showed at first Spades, and then a fit in Hearts, and NS reached the slam in Hearts, which was played by S.

D'Alelio (W) leads King of Diamonds. Declarer took this trick with an Ace

played the Clubs twice (D'Alelio layed down the Jack at first,

then 3 of Clubs.

Then Declarer leads 5 of Spades.

After a short reflection, to the amazement of the fans, D'Alelio lays down the Queen. Declarer took it with the Dummy`s King and, taking the trick, he smiled triumphantly.

He leads with 2  of Spades. Chiaradia wins it with 9 of Spades and leads 10 of Clubs.  

Declarer put down the queen. The fans, who were expecting 6 of Hearts, again experienced a moment of surprise, because D'Alelio  layed down the Ace of Spades. 
Now S is helpless. He must kill the third spades with a Queen of Hearts (otherwise D'Alelio, who no longer has a Spades, will interrupt the small trump card with a 10 of Hearts), and this develops a trump trick for the Defenders (for the pair D'Alelio - Chiaradia). The contract is failed.

All around said: “Well, he is lucky, this D'Alelio. He got such a special alignment”.

But if you analyze the course of the game, then there is nothing surprising that D'Alelio decided to take down the ace of spades. According to the bridge rules, Dummy`s  cards after the first lead are laid open on the table, and it is clear that he has 5 cards in Spades.

After 4 cards have been played, the layout of the cards has already become clear:

Declarer South (S) does not have a Jack of Spades, otherwise he would take 9 of Spades with a Jack, and Dummy's 10 of Spades would be the highest card in the suit. This means that Professor Chiaradia has the Jack of Spades, and South (S) has no more Spades, and he expects to score all the other Spades with trump cards. And from this it follows that in order to destroy the opponents' slam, the West needs to get rid of the last Spade.
Of course, this will not prevent the point guard from ruffing Diamonds with the Dummy's small trump card.

Next Declarer`s lead will surely check the alignment of the trump cards, and if they were 3-1, then he would have no problems:  all the trump cards could be taken away with Ace, King and Queen.
Then 10 of Spades from Dummy becomes the highest card.
But after Dummy`s Ace of trump, it turned out that the trump cards were 4-0.

Now the Declarer will be forced to ruff Dummy`s Spade with a Queen of trumps so that D'Alelio does not interrupt the small trump card with his 10 of Hearts.

But then D'Alelio will receive a trick for the trump card, because he will put 10 on a Declarer`s lead with 9 hearts, and his 8 becomes a top card.

On the fourth lead the spade, D'Alelio will interrupt the small trump card of the South.

If you try to take away the trump cards, then the North has 3, and the West has 8.
The contract is failed.

If you take four trump cards, then they will have nothing to ruff the Jack of Spades of Chiaradia, which has become the highest card (in this case, they will have to give the second trick in Spades, and even the third trick too, because there are no more trump cards).






In any case, they are forced to give one more trick, which means that instead of 12 tricks they will receive only 11.
And therefore, the pair Chiaradia - D'Alelio won this board.