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But not spectacular.

                               Bread and Butter.

That’s part-scores, while playing Pairs in particular. There is no need to bid dubious games. Making them via overtricks can be very rewarding. Looking at the hands below, the last thing on North’s mind was bidding to game. They were happy to transfer to spades and then head off to make the coffees, leaving their partner to make as many tricks as they could.

 

2 showed spades with West leading 10. You may as well cover as did East with the Q and your A won the trick. What now?

Another dubious looking part-score though on most days, you should not lose more than two trumps, two hearts and a diamond. Chances are that the lead is either a singleton or doubleton and if they score a ruff and that you still have two more trump losers, then even 8 tricks might be hard. (though you do have a potentially useful 8 up your sleeve.)

So, drawing trumps seems a good plan. East is more likely than West to hold the A since they opened the bidding. So, if you lead Q, East will win, play K and then give their partner a ruff. Even though you have the high 8 for a heart discard, that’s no way to get (m) any overtricks!

Maybe a bit of subtlety is needed? This should not work though should be worth a try. Play your two top clubs and ruff a club. Bad luck if you suffer an over-ruff. Not today!

Now, lead a low trump from dummy. Note if East has AJx, they cannot take their ace without losing a trump trick (the jack). So, they have to wait to give their partner a ruff…and had you three spades, that would be too late.

That was not the lay-out but East may not realise they had to rise with the ace to give their partner a ruff. Indeed, East does not even know if their partner has a second trump. Also, it is not 100% guaranteed that you hold Q. Mostly you would but if you had two or three small spades…well, maybe not!

 So, by playing a trump from dummy, you gave East a losing option of playing low as this was the lay-out:

 

Had South played Q at trick 2, East would win, play K and give West a diamond ruff. West does best to exit a low heart though clashing Q and K does not matter since after winning and drawing trumps, a low heart will disappear on the 8 enabling South to score 9 tricks.

 

That should have been the case if East had risen with A but they did not. Declarer won to play a second trump won by East who switched to the K, ducked by South. East exited a trump but declarer could draw trump and set up that 8 for a useful heart discard, the only losers being A, K and a diamond…10 tricks but South did not mind being in part-score.

 

All because South played the first trump from dummy. There may sometimes be no benefit but there was here.

 

South could not have realised the benefit when they played clubs at trick 2 but was well rewarded..a well-earned extra overtrick, an important feature of Pairs bridge.

 

 

Rewarded with the jam!

 

Which way for slam?

You kind of did well to bid slam but only if you make 12 tricks and there’s an immediate problem.

 

North leads their spade and South follows with theirs. What’s the plan?

Richard Solomon

 

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