The Times Improve Your Bridge Game. Andrew Robson
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notrumps) first, you are declarer. After your left-hand opponent has made the opening lead, dummy is tabled. You say ‘thank you partner’, and then control both the dummy (next to play) and your own hand.
Do not rush to play from dummy (Tip 89), or unthinkingly make the seemingly obvious play (Tip 90). Instead form a plan. This involves counting top tricks (Tip 91), seeing how many extra ones are needed for the contract, and focussing on where to get those extra tricks. In notrumps, the quest for those extra tricks should be attended to immediately, whereas in trump contracts there is the issue of when to get rid of the opponents’ trumps.
Once the extra tricks have been garnered, the top tricks can be taken (‘cashed’). Care needs to be taken to ensure that you do not get stranded from a winner in the other hand. If you are leading from the hand with the shorter length, lead the highest card; if you are leading from the hand with the longer length, lead the lowest card (Tip 92).
Notrump Play
MAKING EXTRA TRICKS Counting top tricks before embarking on the play is particularly important in notrumps; only by doing this will you know how many extra tricks are needed. The three basic methods of setting up those extra tricks are (a) by force (flushing out an opposing higher card), (b) by length (exhausting the opponents of all their cards in a suit in which you have greater length), and (c) by position (finessing – trying to promote a card even though the opponents hold a higher card in that same suit).
Because length and positional winners both require the split and location of missing cards to be favourable, force winners – if available – are usually to be preferred, even in a relatively short suit (Tip 93). But length is crucial in notrumps – overlook a long, weak suit at your peril (Tip 94). Many notrump contracts boil down to a race between both sides to set up their long suits and it is imperative that you (and for that matter the defence) lead your long suit each time you win the lead (Tip 95). Finessing, a technique equally useful in trumps and notrumps, involves assessing which card you are trying to promote, then leading from the opposite side. The hope is that the opposing higher card will be in the hand of the opponent playing second i.e. sitting ahead of your card (Tip 96).
DUCKING Deliberately not winning a trick is called ducking and plays a major role in notrump play. If the opponents lead a suit in which you have just one certain stopper (a stopper is a way of stopping the opponents running through a suit), you have a decision to make: when should you use the card (assume it’s an ace – by far the most likely scenario)? By delaying winning with the ace, you can exhaust one opponent of all their cards of the suit (Tip 97). You should try to win your ace on that opponent’s last card (Tip 98). The Rule of Seven (Tip 99), will often give you the right answer.
AVOIDANCE PLAY The danger of the opposition running off a long suit is an ever-present one in notrumps (in trumps you can simply trump). Often, just one opponent can create such problems for you – in which case he is the ‘danger hand’ and his partner is the ‘safe hand’ (Tip 100). Look for ways to prevent the danger hand from winning the lead (Tip 101). If you can choose which opponent to make the danger hand, choose the one who will not win a subsequent lead (Tip 102).
SETTING UP A SUIT If you need to set up a suit (usually five or more cards) in one hand, you must make sure that you have enough entries (ways of reaching that hand). Tricks will normally have to be lost in the establishment process and note that it is almost always better to lose the first round rather than a later round (Tip 103). This ensures that the high cards in the suit itself are meaningful entries (Tip 104), thereby retaining better communications (Tip 105). Counting your top tricks – and therefore how many extra tricks are needed from the long suit – can affect how you broach the suit (Tip 106).
ANALYSING THE OPENING LEAD AND THE RULE OF ELEVEN The standard opening lead against a notrump contract is fourth from the top of the longest suit. In those situations you can use the mathematically foolproof Rule of 11 (Tip 107). Taking the (fourth highest) opening lead from 11 tells you how many higher cards than the lead are in the other three hands (Tip 108). You can see your hand and dummy so can work out how many higher (although not which they are) are with the leader’s partner. The Rule of 11 enables you to make strange-looking plays with later benefits (Tip 109). And in case you are wondering, after all this, why the opponents do lead fourth from the top and give you so much help, bear in mind that the opening leader’s partner can also use the Rule of 11 (Tip 110).
Other inferences can be drawn from the ‘fourth highest’ opening lead. The lead of a two indicates that the leader holds precisely four cards in that suit (Tip 111). When the lead is a three, look out for the two: if the leader does not hold it, again he has just four cards in the suit led (Tip 112). If he has just four cards in the suit led, he will not have five cards in another suit – or he would have preferred to lead that suit (Tip 113). If he led from a very feeble four-card suit, he is unlikely to have another four-card suit (it would be stronger): thus his shape is probably 4333 (Tip 114).
SUMMARY Count up your top tricks and plan to establish your extra tricks early. Look out for the three basic methods of establishing tricks in notrumps – by force, length and position. And don’t forget to analyze the opening lead – it can give you huge pointers.
Trump Play
DRAWING TRUMPS The key question is whether or not to get rid of (‘draw’) the opposing trumps at the beginning. If you need dummy’s trumps, perhaps for trumping your losers (Tip 115), then you must delay. On the other hand drawing their trumps removes the risk of the opponents trumping your winners (Tip 116). Drawing trumps is particularly attractive, somewhat ironically, when you have weak trumps, because it gets rid of two of their (high) trumps together (Tip 117). However, there is a middle route: you can draw all but one of their trumps. If the last remaining trump is higher than yours, leave it out. There is rarely any point in wasting two of your trumps to draw a trump that is going to win a trick anyway – The Rule of One (Tip 118).
TRUMPING IN THE DUMMY If you draw trumps, the trumps in your shorter trump length (typically, so let us assume, dummy) will not make tricks in their own right; they will fall under the longer trumps. Therefore if you can use dummy’s trumps for ‘ruffing’ (trumping), the manoeuvre will create extra tricks. You will not generally be able to draw the opposing trumps first though, or dummy’s trumps will be gone (Tip 119).
The process is to look for a suit that is shorter in dummy