High Card from the Short Side - Defence

I have talked about Declarer playing the High card from the Short Side in this post:
Declarer Play - High Cards from the Short Side

This is standard declarer play. I think it is the first thing I teach my students about declarer play and it is something that the experts do. The reason why it works so well is that by doing this the suit does NOT get blocked.

Does it matter if you are playing in NT or a suit? No. You play High Cards from the Short Side first.
Does it matter if the suit is black or red? A major or a minor? Pointy or round? No. You play High Cards from the Short Side first.
Does it matter if the suit is trump or not? No. You play High Cards from the Short Side first.

So, in short, it is the IDEAL way to play the suit.

In fact it does not even matter if you are Declarer OR on Defence. The concept remains the same. High Card from the Short Side.

But it is QUITE a bit more difficult on Defence. Let's see this in action:

	Dummy
	763
Partner's Lead		Your holding
K		A2

Declarer calls for a low card from Dummy. What card do you play?

Think about it and answer honestly.

Do you need to know what the contract is? No. You will do the same thing in NT and also trump.

Does it matter what the suit is? No. You will do the same thing if this is a major or a minor, a black suit or a red suit, or a pointy suit or a round suit.

You should OVERTAKE your Partner's winning trick with your Ace and play back the suit.

It seems strange. Partner is winning the trick after all. But what happens if you play low? Partner will continue the suit and you will win this trick. But you have no more of the suit to return to Partner.

Let's say this is the holding:

	Dummy
	763
Partner's Holding		Your holding
KQJT9		A2
	Declarer's holding
	854

Try dealing out these cards at home. Pretend the contract is 3NT. How are you and Partner going to defeat the contract? You have to OVERTAKE Partner's opening lead and play back the suit. If you don't, Partner will win the trick. Then they will play the suit again. You will win the trick. But how do you get back to Partner's winning tricks?

You can't.

Responding - Bid your Four Card Major before NT

Let's take a look at a hand that came up the other day. Here it is:
♠KJ83
♥K8
♦QJ95
♣KJ6

Your Partner opens the bidding 1♥. What is your bid?

Think about it.

Most disciplined players came up with the best bid of 1♠. That gives Partner an easy rebid. They will bid 4♠. Now it is your turn to bid. What will you respond to 4♠?

If you stop to think about the auction, you will not Pass. You have shown 6 HCP. Partner has just bid a game thinking you have 6 HCP. This means that Partner has about 20 points. Sure they get to count Dummy points, but it still adds up to 20 points. You've got 14 points. That's enough for a slam. Your bid should now be 6♠.

Here are the two hands:
Dummy:
♠AQT2
♥AQT72
♦9
♣AQ5

Declarer:
♠KJ83
♥K8
♦QJ95
♣KJ6

You can see that while Partner only has 18 HCP, they do have a singleton which is perfect for your hand. It was easy to take 12 tricks.

What was the problem?

The problem occurred on the first response. Some players with this hand:
♠KJ83
♥K8
♦QJ95
♣KJ6

Responded 3NT rather than 1♠.

Now let's take a look at what Opener has to think about.

Opener has this hand:
♠AQT2
♥AQT72
♦9
♣AQ5

and of course opens 1♥. No problem there.

But after Openers opening bid, imagine if Responder had bid 3NT? That shows a balanced hand with 13-15 HCP. It should DENY having ♥ support and ALSO DENY having another four card major. The four-four major suit fit is TOO important to bypass.

So now what does Opener do? The partnership might have enough for a small slam. But it might not. Plus Opener is worried about the ♦ suit. In fact, in 6NT the Opponents can take the first two ♦ tricks. Not a good slam. 6♠ is a good slam.

But Opener is not going to think the partnership has a ♠ fit once Responder bids any number of NT.

Trump Suit Quality Exercises

This post tests your knowledge of asking for trump quality in bidding potential slams. Before reading any further make sure you have read these posts:
Trump Suit Quality - 5 of the Major
Grand Slam Force

Grand Slam Force and bidding 5 of the Major are just a few ways to get to a slam. These bids do not come up that often. Neither do slams. However sometimes slams come up and a partnership just does not possess the bids available to get there properly. You do NOT have to bid properly in order to get there. You are allowed to just blast there. This works especially well for newer players.

Think about it. How many times were you in game making 12 tricks and said to yourself "I REALLY wanted to bid more on that hand but I just didn't know how." Probably quite a few times.

Now think of how many times you played in game and just made it or maybe took 1 overtrick and said to yourself "Sure am glad I didn't bid more! I really wanted to bid a slam on that hand! I would have gone down!" Probably not many times at all.

So next time you want to bid further but don't know how -- JUST DO IT! Just bid at the 6 level! You don't HAVE to bid properly. You don't HAVE to know what you are doing. If your gut tells you to bid a slam -- LISTEN!

Sure you might go down in some -- but I bet you'll make most of them! Plus think of all the fun you will have.

In any case, now you have a few more tools to use to help you in bidding your slams properly.

Let's put some of these latest bids to the test.

On ALL the following hands you opened the bidding 1♠ and Partner bid 3♠ showing 4 trump and 11 or 12 points. What is your bid?

Remember you can bid either:
Pass
4♠
5♠
5NT
6♠
7♠

So what will you bid and give your reason for bidding what you did.

Opener	Responder
1♠	3♠
???

Hand 1

♠Q98632
♥AK62
♦KQ
♣8



Hand 2

♠AKQJ75
♥AQT9
♦
♣A87



Hand 3

♠A8763
♥AK872
♦4
♣AK



Hand 4

♠AQJT97
♥AJ
♦AJ83
♣A



Hand 5

♠A9732
♥KJT
♦K6
♣AK7



Hand 6

♠A98532
♥AK
♦
♣AKQ92



Hand 7

♠AK6432
♥AQJ
♦K8
♣82



Hand 8

♠K98542
♥AKQ742
♦A
♣



Hand 9

♠AJ974
♥Q92
♦A4
♣AK9



Hand 10

♠AQJ73
♥A976
♦AK74
♣



Hand 11

♠K8763
♥AK875
♦A5
♣8



Hand 12

♠J98542
♥AKQ742
♦A
♣



Hand 13

♠AKQ97
♥754
♦A8
♣QJ2



Hand 14

♠AKT32
♥K98
♦A82
♣A2



Hand 15

♠J98532
♥AK
♦
♣AKQ92



Hand 16

♠K97653
♥A
♦AKJT6
♣A