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Losing Trick Count and Cover Card Evaluation
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Aside from obstructive preempts and competing in partscore contracts, bidding is all about making contracts and knowing when to stop short, lacking values.  And to make our contracts requires accurate partnership bidding.  Sound bidding is predicated on good hand evaluation and solid partnership communication skills.  Of course, the proof of the pudding is in the eating and sound bidding is predicated on the ability of partnership hands to make tricks.

As always, tricks made during play is based three elements: Power, Promotion, and in the case of suit contracts, Ruffing

Power: Reflecting on hand evaluation, we begin counting our High Card Points.

Promotion: Next we consider the shape of our hand, adding extras for a “good” long suit headed by top honors – a promotable trump or side suit to gain extra tricks during declarer play.

Ruffing: Side suit shortness, especially in the dummy also can help generate extra tricks provided we have enough trump to gain ruffing tricks as declarer.

Speaking of honors, presents come in several sizes:

1. Primary honors – Aces and Kings are usually more desirable than Queens and Jacks, especially at higher level contracts.
2. Working honors – Clustering honors in fewer suits can earn extra tricks through finessing during declarer play.
3. Picking up a self-sustaining suit is an extra special present – everyone loves to pick up a long, strong suit that is guaranteed not to lose more than one trick… even when partner only holds a worthless singleton.  Even a semi self-sustaining suit with two losers in an unsupported suit makes a nice gift.  Shortly, we will get into more details on this concept.

While counting 1 extra point for each card beyond the first four trump works well for 5 and six card suits, with 7+ card suit and two suited hands length point valuation undervalues the worth of the hand.  Certainly a 12 card suit heading missing the Ace is worth more than 6 (K=3, Q=2, J=1) plus 8 points.  Despite its 14 point valuation, clearly we can see the hand will take 11 tricks even when partner has a bust hand.

Speaking of the more garden variety partnership fits, in Bridge we always look forward to finding a “golden fit” with partner, a major suit with 8+ combined length that usually generates at least 4 tricks in the trump suit.

Polling You #75, Hand 1

.South opens 1 Spade with a great 16 High Card Point hand plus 1-2 distribution points for a shapely hand.  North responds 2 Spades with 7 HCP plus 1-2 points for the extra trump and the Diamond doubleton.  Without using losing trick count hand evaluation (5 LTC), South will likely rebid 3 Diamonds – a help suit game try.  Holding a Diamond Ace-doubleton, North gladly responds 4 Spades despite holding 7 HCP.

On play, West wins the first Club with declarer South winning the second trick ruffing a Spade.  South plays 3 rounds of trump to clear the suit with a typical 3-1 split.  Next South ruffs a Diamond loser in dummy, conceding 1 Heart loser to make 11 tricks.

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Polling You #75, Hand 1a

.South’s hand is identical to Hand #1, while North’s Heart suit changes from the Heart King to the Queen.  Again South opens 1 Spade with a great 16 High Card Point hand plus 1-2 distribution points for a shapely hand.  North responds 2 Spades with 6 HCP plus 1-2 points for the extra trump and the Diamond doubleton.  Without using losing trick count hand evaluation (5 LTC), South will likely rebid 3 Diamonds – a help suit game try.  Holding a Diamond Ace-doubleton, North gladly responds 4 Spades despite holding 7 HCP.

On play, West wins the first Club with declarer South winning the second trick ruffing a Spade.  South plays 3 rounds of trump to clear the suit with a typical 3-1 split.  Next South ruffs a Diamond loser in dummy.  This time the success of the contract is contingent on the location of the Heart King.   Indeed, this time West holds and wins the Heart King on the finesse try, declarer conceding 1 Heart loser to make the 10 trick game.  So even though North held a margin hand with only 1 control (Diamond Ace), South was correct to chance game with at least 50-50 odds to receive a juicy game bonus.

Happy Bridge Trails and Tales,

BridgeHands

Polling You #75, Hand 9