Vil Gravis's blog

This is not a double dummy play problem but more about bidding, featuring yet again what seems to be the constant shunning of the minor suit slam. It is true that in this deal, 3NT played by North and making overtricks would have scored over 80% so you might say, why worry about bidding any slams. At match points it is no big deal, but at teams, bidding the good slams can make a huge difference. But let’s see why a very good small slam (which makes an overtrick played double dummmy) was either too difficult to bid, or simply eschewed in favour of the easily bid 3NT.

Board 7 from Thursday 23/05/24
Dealer S All Vul

	QT76 32 AJ2 AT54
J42 T7 QT86543 2		953 QJ985 K7 Q86
	AK8 AK64 9 KJ973

Chapter 2: Which Suit, Which card?
The problems we saw earlier were not that difficult when you thought about them, were they? You had a clear indication of which suit to lead, and, hopefully the logical rules of ‘fourth highest’ or ‘ace when you have AK in your suit’ were good enough to get you off to the best start. There is a good reason why it is important to have a specific system and understanding of what each card led on the opening lead is trying to say, because partner needs to know that. So, let’s now take a look at what all the cards, from the ace down to the humble deuce, should generally mean to any partnership. Then, when the basic understandings are there, we can look at even more sophisticated ways we can use all of the thirteen cards we are dealt, be they aces and kings or little pip cards.

Introduction: Some thoughts

Here are some things you may not know, or even have thought about, when you have begun on your wonderful journey in the game of bridge:

Surprisingly few players seem to play suit preference signals, though they are not at all difficult to understand or make use of when required. Here is an example of the very basic suit preference signal, though in the actual deal, Deep Finesse would have made the contract despite the defenders’ use of the signal. Yes, the suit preference signal can also help declarer if declarer knows that that is what it is!

Board 8 from Friday 5/04/24
Dealer W Nil Vul

	9 Q765 J742 QJ64
Q85 KJ942 KT8 K5		J732 83 AQ653 A9
	AKT64 AT 9 T8732

This deal comes from the archives because I had a question from one of my regular readers, Sam, who asked about opening leads of singleton trumps. He has heard me say often enough that the lead of a singleton trump is one of the worst imaginable, because a) the first thing every declarer does when playing a hand is to draw trumps, so why do it for him and b) it is almost certain to solve any two way finesse problem if there is one. However, just to put it into context, I always add the proviso that there should always be a reason for doing what you do, especially when you make an opening lead, because the opening lead sets the scene for the rest of your defence, and the opening lead should tell your partner what you are hoping to achieve on defence. I then dug out this particular deal from my archives, a series I labelled “Ultimate Defence”. The reader may like to look at the deal and treat it as a double dummy problem before I continue the story in DD18.

Dealer West All Vul; Teams

	982 A852 2 QT653
5 6 AQJT75 AKJ94		KQT63 QJT7 K96 2
	AJ74 K943 843 87