Hand of the day #174
The Aces On Bridge by Bobby Wolff It was Gordon Gecko who famously opined that g...
This conundrum was written by Patrick O'Connor and was originally published in the book A Second Book of Bridge Problems - you can find out all about it further down the page.
These are the steps in planning the play in a notrump contract:
An example of counting your winners:
South is in 3NT. West leads the ♣Q.
Look at both hands, suit by suit. In spades, you have the ace, king and queen that could win you three separate tricks. You might make two more tricks with the nine and the eight but this is not certain so you can’t yet count them as winners. They will have to be developed. In hearts you have one immediate winner — the ace. In diamonds you have no winners! Tricky here — you won’t have any certain winners until you have lost a trick to the ace but after that trick the remaining high cards will be winners. In clubs you have two winners. So you have six winners and must develop three more to make 3NT.
How can you develop three more tricks? Looking at spades, the opponents have five between them. About two-thirds of the time one person will have three spades and the other two. Roughly a quarter of the time they split 4-1 and a 5-0 split is pretty uncommon. It doesn’t hurt to remember these numbers. If they split 3-2 this will give you five spade tricks but only eight winners in total. The best bet is the diamond suit. Once you knock out the ♦A you will have three winners, which is just what you need. So you plan to lead a diamond as soon as you get in and keep leading them until the ace appears. This will give you nine tricks. Then if the spades break 3-2 you will get two extra tricks as a bonus.
Like the author's first book (A First Book of Bridge Problems, named Book of the Year for 2012 by the American Bridge Teachers Association), this sequel comprises fifty problems in declarer play and defense for the beginning or near-beginning player, presented in approximate order of difficulty. The problems are slightly more advanced than those in the first book. Experienced players recognize certain standard situations without having to work them out. This does not apply to novices, who spend a lot of mental effort on them. The aim of the book is to get novices to develop their recognition of these situations. The idea is to present bridge hands as the reader would encounter them playing at the table. Unlike in a textbook, where topics are introduced systematically, there is no clue as to what type of play is required. Winner of the 2014 ABTA Book of the Year of the Award in the Beginner/Novice category!
