~

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This is the first ina weekly series on Defense at spridge. It is sometimes said that defense is the most poorly-played aspect of the game ;my experiences at U.- p.E.L. would certainly serve to bear this out.

And yet, it surely must be more important to play good defense than to be a good declarer. After all, assum- ing the laws of averages hold true, then you will play defense twice as often as you. play declarer.

It will be the intention of

the Ruff Can Wait,

‘defense at bridge

Devel | he

dave gallant.

e

this column, then, to try to give you some pointers in this sadly neglected foeld. In order to make the column as similar as possible to play at the table, at the beginning of the column, only your hand and the dummy hand will be visible - just like_ at the table. Please do not look at the other two hands as presented further down until you have attempted to find your right line of play. It will ruin the purpose of the column.

Anyway, I talked long eno- ugh. On to the first hand.

’ x4

‘Phe Cadre, December 2, 1975, page 9

op Your Other

W K1063 E 542 S J10874 13 SOUTH = S AJ8 H QJ1073 DAK2 C 106 Bidding SOUTH WEST NORTH EAST 1 Be oPags :21C Pass 2:NT* Pass’ 3H Pass 4H Pass Pass Pass

Your partner leads the 3 of clubs against South's four heart contract. The 2 is played from dummy and South plays the ten under your ace. How should you continue?

This is a simple matter of counting your tricks and getting the timing ri- ght. Partner's 3 of clubs isan: obvious singleton so you can give him a ruff and the king of hearts will be the 3rd defensive trick. Where is the set- ting trick to come from? Well, either partner must have an ace or he must have the king of spades.

(Af it is.the latter: case

Tricks First

you must be careful. Su- ppose you lead a club and give partner his ruff im- mediately. He will be un- able to attack spades from his side of the table so he will lead, say, a trump. Your king will be allowed to win, and when you lead a spade declarer will go up with his ace, drawing trumps ending in dummy and

discard his spade losers

on the clubs.

To be sure of making all tricks available to the de- fensé, you must lead a sp- ade at trick 2. There is no need to hurry to give your partner a ruff, since on the bidding he is marked with 3 trumps.

The missing hands!

NORTH

S Q94

H A96

D3

C KQJ872 S 752 E H K8 A D Q965 S$ Cc A954. T

Three no trump is, of cou- rse, a superior contract.

{us

a

DAMN THAT RUDOLPH...

I™ GOING

TO HAVE TO

GET RADAR!

MACRAE /CHANDLER 75”