A BRIDGE CLINIC

Southland Times, Issue 21773, 30 July 1932, Page 11

A BRIDGE CLINIC

(By “Horatius”) AUCTION CONTRACT

On the matter of inferences, a correspondent has asked how it is possible to make deductions when playing with people who do not observe the conventions of play. That is a very fair question, and the reply is that in such compahy the expert player will endeavour to discover as quickly as possible any habits in the players to assist him in drawing deductions. He may also seize the opportunity to instruct his own partner on the rudimentary elements of defensive play, and the value of exchanging information through conventional leads and discards. Included in the study of peculiarities is, of course, an appreciation of the basis of the other players’ bidding. That is why a knowledge of systems is valuable. If you can place one of your opponents definitely as the follower of a certain system of bidding and you understand that system, the bidding can supply information, making it possible to read the hand of the other opposing player, who follows no system. Remember, every Auction player of more than a month’s experience has a system. It may be a bad one, it may go only a little way, but it begins with, the minimum strength for an opening bid, and on that basis you can build your “Intelligence work.” There are players who will never bid a trump unless they hold five of a suit. There are some who bid One in a minor suit to show Two Aces or their equivalent in Quick Tricks; there are some who bid on four-card suits to A-Q-x-x. In each case the alert player obtains information, and he may find it of vital importance to him in fixing the distribution of suits and, therefore the location of cards. But in play, also, information can be gained. If a player follows no conventions of play, the opportunities to read with certainty are cut down; but even : then it is possible to make use of char- I acteristics, and the good player can be | sure that the player who takes no no- j tice of any play conventions and is erratic, can be driven into blunders which will more than counter-balance the other “advantage.” Bridge, however, requires these play conventions in order to be really enioyable, and to meet the inquiry of another correspondent, I will repeat the ones now generally accepted: Leads: From A-K to lead Ace first tells the partner, when the King follows you have no more in that suit. To lead King means you hold the Ace or the Queen. Otherwise you lead the highest of touching honours, —from A-J-10-x, the Jack would be led. If you lead from a suit not bid by your partner, and do not open with an honour, the card will be taken as the fourth highest of the suit—that is a lead recognized as sound since the days of Whist. To lead 9 or 8 means the “top of nothing” and does not ask partner to return it. Leading the suit bid by your partner, you lead the highest if you 1 nd only two cards in the suit; if you hold three cards headed by 10 or lower lead the top card always; if you hold four cards lead low against NoTrumps, but if they are headed, by Ace or Q-J, play the highest against an adverse trumo declaration. In all these cases the bidding may make variations advisable, but against NoTrump the lowest of three cards headed by Jack is led unless the . Bidding suggests otherwise.

Against No-Trumps you do not lead the Ace unless, you wish your partner to throw his highest honoui' to allow you to make a number of tricks, when you lack a sure reentry. Holding A-K-J-10-x-x and no re-entry, the Ace would ask your partner to throw the Queen if he holds it. If he does not play the Queen, the declarant is credited with it. In England they employ the King in the same way, but that is not so good because it means, that the King’s regular duty—showing the position of the Ace or Queen is abolished.

There are some players who use a lead of the 10 to disclose a higher honour, as well as a card in sequence. Such a player would lead 10 from K-10-9-x, but not from K-10-8-x or from 10-9-8-x. Many modern experts, however, now use the lead of the 10 as the lead from the ‘top of nothing” like the 9. You will soon discover which of these ideas, if

either, a player favours. Now, on the basis of these few conventions of play it is posible to build an effective collection of inferences. Suppose your partner leading against NoTrumps starts with the 2 of Spades. He has four of that suit because the 2 is the fourth highest. If he lead the 3 and the 2 can be seen, his holding is 4-card in length, but if the 2 cannot be seen and is not played he may have a 5-card suit. If he play the 2 on the second round of the suit, he held a 5card suit.

If your partner lead the 9 of a suit’ against a suit declaration, it probably is a short suit. If he bid another suit, in the auction, this lead of the. 9 means a short suit definitely. His bid would be on 4 cards to A-Q at least, and he has not opened that suit, so that the 9 is from three cards or less.. It is important to apply this information to play. If your partner’s lead discloses a 5-card suit, and he had not made a bid, he must hold less than the minimum strength required for the bid. It means, too, that he holds one suit which is a doubleton at most. The most even pattern he can have is 5-3-3-2. Now, what does he hold in the suit he led ? Obviously not A-K, A-Q-J, A-J-10, or A-10-9, because in each of those cases he. would have led an honour. It is unlikely that he has led away from K-J, or K-Q, but he may have led from A-J or K-10. If, after, bidding, he leads the 9 of the other suit, he prefers to have the bid suit led to him which means that he is in a tenace position. Therefore, there is no need

for you to waste high honours on his opening lead unless you can be sure of taking the trick and giving him the lead he requires. He should prefer suits headed by A-K or K-Q-J to a doubleton or singleton suit and you are entitled to credit him with those,ideas, so that inferences working in reverse can tell you that if he led a doubleton or singleton in preference to his bid suit, that bid suit has at best K-Q at the top, but probably has a tenace at its head.

Game is the purpose of the bidding. ! Slams come along at intervals, in probi ably 10 per cent of the hands at most, • but game possibilities must be sought ■ always. Here is a hand from a Dupli- • cate game which has special points: S: K, 10, 8 H: Q, 7,6, 2 1 D: Q, J, 8,6, 3 : C: 3 I S:Q,9, 7, 6 ’ N S: 2 1 H: 10 W-E H: K, J, 9,8, 3 r D: A, K, 10, 9,4, 2 D: 5 [C:K, J S C: Q,8,7, 6,5,2 ! S: A, J, 5,4, 3 : H: A, 5, 4 ; D: 7 . C: A, 10, 9, 4 ; South was the dealer. N —S vulneri able and E—W not vulnerable. The I bidding went: S. W. N. E. [ Ist Rd IS 2D 2S 3H ’ 2nd Rd 4S No No No ’ When West bid Two Diamonds it was 1 clear he had five in that suit, and : North’s Diamonds lost their value, but 1 he had a singleton Club, and adequate i support in Spades so he tried a shaded raise. East’s distribution, in view of : the bidding, justified his try for Three ’ Hearts. South’s anxiety for game led him to risk overbidding his hand .by one trick. West opened with the King of Diamonds, and when Dummy showed length in that suit shifted to the 10 of Hearts, East’s bid. South went after the cross ruff to make use of North’s trump on the Clubs and his own trumps on Diamonds. When the Queen of Diamonds was led by North after’ the second lead of Cubs gave a ruff, East’s 2 of trumps was used to prevent South’s Heart discard. If East discarded Diamonds on the Clubs, the late situation disclosed was i H: Q-7-6 I D: J I N S: Q-9-7-6 W-E H: K-J-9 S C: Q S: A-J H: 5-4 South is in the lead and a Heart compels West to lead to A-J of trumps, giving South game. If West had ruffed both third and fourth round of Clubs, with Dummy evertrumping, West could discard a Diamond on the Heart led by South and permit East to make his Jack and return the suit and defeat the contract. Another interesting hand from actual play: S: A, J, 10, 8 3 H: Q-J, 2 D: 9,8, 7 C: 9 7 S: Q, 7,6, 2 ’ N S: K, 9, 4 H: A, 6, 4 W—E H: K, 8,5, 3 D: A, 5,3, 2 D: K, Q, J C: 5, 4 S C: K, Q, 8 S: 5 H: 10, 9, 7 D: 10, 6, 4 C: A, J, 10, 6,3, 2 Both sides were vulnerable and South was the dealer. The bidding was: S. W. N. E. Ist Rd No No No INT 2nd Rd No 2NT No 3NT

3rd Rd No No No — East has 3J lonour Tricks and his bid is therefore sound. West holds 2 Honour Tricks plus a Q-x-x-x, which means 5J between lhe two hands, but he leaves the game bid to East, who tries for game of course. South Opened with the Club 6 on which North played the 9, which held! East, knowing his opponents must get in on either Spades or Hearts, hoped North holds those winners and played to exhaust his Clubs. North returned the Club and South won with the Ace and cleared the suit. East then cashed his three high Diamonds and led a small Heart to the Dummy, .winning with the Ace. North on, this trick played the Jack. In view .oL- the strength shown in Clubs by South,East could place the Ace of Spades .in the North ’’and, otherwise South, with a six-card suit containing 1-r Honour Tricks and an outside Ace, would have had the strength to justify an Opening bid.

North’s play on the Heart Jack was the first step in an effort to create an entry for his partner to run his established Clubs. North, also had been doing some card placing and felt sure that his partner had no possible entry in Spades. The Ace of Diamonds in Dummy was led and on this all three discarded Spades. A small Heart was now led and North played the Queen to complete the unblocking and give his partner an entry with the 10 of Hearts to cash his established tricks. It is, of course, clear that North did not know that South held the Heart 10 but if he did not hold it then game, was lost m any event.

The unblocking play by North was very fine. East, however, still had .a shot in his locker and refused to win the trick. Now North could do nothing but return a Heart and East won two more Heart tricks and then threw North in with a Spad' thus establishing one Spade for the game-going contract.

Here is a hand cited by Mr Cuthbertson as “psychological bidding at the perfection of its bloom.” The application made of the information disclosed by his opponents in their ex-