Summary
Now let’s combine everything you’ve learnt in this declarer-play course.
Counting your tricks
When the dummy goes down, always start by counting your tricks and planning how you will play the hand. Do not fall into the trap of auto-playing from the dummy: you may be going down in your contract already if you do so!
In NT contracts, start by counting your winners. These should be sure winners; that is, tricks that you can take as soon as you gain the lead (or tricks that the opponents’ lead has already given to you). Once you know how many tricks you already have, you will need to decide how to make up the shortfall: which suit(s) are the other tricks coming from and which technique(s) will you use to create more tricks?
In suit contracts, start by counting your losers. Use the hand with the longer trumps as the base hand for how many losers are possible in each suit. Imagine that you are not going to use any fancy techniques; you will simply play the highest card you have in the suit, followed by the second highest and so on, until you have gone through the length you have in the suit in the base hand. How many tricks will you end up losing in each suit and then overall? Are there any techniques you can use to avoid losing any of them?
Techniques for suit contracts
Normally, when you are playing a suit contract, your default first move should be to draw the trumps in the opponents’ hands. The idea is to be able to enjoy your winners without the opponents being able to trump (or “ruff”) them; as you have more trumps than the opponents, you can afford to draw their trumps and you will still have trumps left so that you can keep control of the hand. You can stop drawing trumps once you know that the opponents have run out.
Occasionally, it will be right to not draw trumps immediately. This will be a hand where you need to ruff a loser/losers in the short hand first. Look for a hand where:
- In one of the side suits, you have more length in the long hand (the base hand) than you do in the short hand.
- You have losers in that suit that you need to deal with.
Start by playing that suit immediately so that you can void yourself in it in the short hand and then ruff.
Techniques for any contract
Some techniques work by establishing your high cards; these will work in a suit or NT contract.
1. Pushing out higher honours
If you have a long sequence of touching honours, you can use this to push out the missing higher honours, thereby establishing the card/cards below.
2. Top of the short
If your sequence of touching honours is split between the declarer and dummy hands, you should first play the top card/cards from the hand with the shorter holding in that suit.
By winning in the longer side later, you will already be in the right hand for continuing to play out the length in the suit – without causing a blockage!
3. Positional Plays
If you have unsupported honours or a shallow sequence of honours all in the same hand, you should play towards the hand with the stronger holding in the suit.
This will potentially trap a missing higher honour between the hand you led from and the hand with the strong holding (if it is the hand in-between that holds that honour).
4. Finesses
If you hold an honour tenace in one hand, or a strong sequence of lower honours in one hand and a higher honour in the other where you are missing an honour in-between, you should take a finesse in the suit. If the tenace is in one hand, you should play a low card towards the lower honour in the tenace; otherwise, play one of the cards in the lower sequence and let that run round.
This may mean that you avoid losing a trick to the missing honour in that suit; it will work if the hand trapped between the hand you led from and the hand with the higher honour is the defender that holds the missing honour.