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 Will you lead Partner's suit? by Andy Hung

Opening Leads. They're the card that sets the tempo of all bridge hands, and it is the first strike that the defense gets. Sometimes declarer's contract is rock solid and the lead doesn't matter, or sometimes the contract is too high and declarer is destined to fail.

What is important is that we must make every effort to choose the best opening lead that will give us the best chance to defeat the contract. Are you ready?

Question 1

  Your Hand
 7 6
 8 2
 J 10 9 4 2
 K Q 6 4
 
Q: 1 - You are South.
SouthWestNorthEast
-111
Pass2Pass4
PassPassPass
You are on lead against 4 after a small competitive auction between partner and the opponents. What do you lead?

 Your choice:
A: 8.

Don't be tempted with either minor suit. They are not strong enough reasons to override the decision to lead partner's suit. In fact, having a doubleton in partner's suit means we could potentially get a ruff!

Your result so far:
Open Question

Question 2

  Your Hand
 5
 A 7 6 2
 8 6 5
 K J 9 6 3
 
Q: 2 - You are South.
SouthWestNorthEast
-111NT
Pass3NTPassPass
Pass
You are on lead against 3NT where partner had overcalled 1 in the midst of the opponents' auction. What do you lead?

 Your choice:
A: 6.

This is a good example hand to not lead partner's suit. Here, we have a singleton Spade which doesn't help our cause to set up partner's suit. Additionally, we have a very good Club suit of our own PLUS we have a side suit entry to boot. These are strong enough reasons to lead our own suit instead of partner's.

Your result so far:
Open Question

Question 3

  Your Hand
 J 8 6 4
 5
 8 7 6 4 2
 6 5 2
 
Q: 3 - You are South.
SouthWestNorthEast
-11Double
Pass2Pass3NT
PassPassPass
With this lovely collection of cards, you will have to find a lead. what do you choose?

 Your choice:
A: 5.

Just because we have a terrible count doesn't mean we shouldn't give this hand much thought. In fact, because the opponents didn't search for a slam, we can deduce that partner should have a decent hand so we should try our best to cooperate with him on defense.

Leading a Diamond here is fair enough but it's not going to do us much good since even if we're able to set up our suit, we have no entries to get back to our hand.

The best thing to do here is to lead partner's suit. Yes, we do have a singleton Heart, but we know that partner has all of the potential entries in his hand so a Heart lead would be much more productive than any other lead.

Your result so far:
Open Question

Question 4

  Your Hand
 7 6 4
 5 4
 K Q J 8 6
 J 8 4
 
Q: 4 - You are South.
SouthWestNorthEast
-112
24PassPass
Pass
You and partner compete lightly in Spades but the Hearts win out this time round. What do you lead?

 Your choice:
A: K.

A Diamond lead stands out for sure. No need to lead our Spade suit when we have a side suit headed by the KQJ!

Your result so far:
Open Question

Question 5

  Your Hand
 6 4
 6 5 3
 8 6 5 2
 8 6 5 2
 
Q: 5 - You are South.
SouthWestNorthEast
-1Double2
Pass4PassPass
Pass
This hand is such a tragedy but don't give up! Time to find the killer lead.

 Your choice:
A: 6.

No other lead comes close to a Spade lead. Partner is marked with strength from the takeout double and the best chance that the defense has here (from the looks of your hand) is to set up a Spade ruff.

When you are on lead against a suit contract with a very weak hand and partner is known to have strength, lead your singletons/doubletons in order to try and get a ruff.

Your result so far:
Open Question

Overall Results

Your results:   out of    Average: 

What next? You may enjoy playing our prepared hands series.
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