Leading Their Suit by Ben Norton

A: ♠6. Your best source of tricks is Spades, so you should lead one despite the suit being bid on your right. East has only promised four Spades, and he’ll have a Heart stopper to justify his 2NT bid. Partner rates to have at least two Spades. If he has K x you’ll probably be able to cash five tricks in the suit. If he has J x then you’ll have set up the suit if declarer wins, and if he ducks nothing has been lost, except if that's declarer's ninth trick. The big gain is when partner has three Spades. Then you stand to cash at least four tricks in the suit, since partner has all the defensive strength outside Spades, he can lead through declarer each time.

Your result so far:

A: ♠10. Despite having a good Diamond holding sitting over declarer, which you expect to be your main source of tricks, it would be a mistake to lead a Diamond. You don’t stand to really gain anything by leading into declarer’s holding. If partner has the King you’ll only be able to take four tricks, not enough to beat the contract. The downside is when partner hasn’t got the King, you’ll just be giving declarer a free trick with one of his honors.

Your best shot is to hope partner can get on lead and push a Diamond through, preferably the Jack. If it turns out that you need to attack Diamonds from your side of the table later, so be it, you’ll probably still have the tempo to do so. Leading from K x x x in dummy’s suit isn’t appealing either. When you lead through dummy you want partner to have the length and strength, not you. It’s too likely that there’s a tenace sitting over you, so leading away from the King will either give away a tempo or a trick if declarer has a stray honor. A safe looking ♠10 from 10 9 x is not only the best passive choice, but it also carries offensive potential. Partner doesn’t have a great deal of strength, so he may well have five Spades, lacking the required power to overcall.

Your result so far:

A: ♠7. This is not the time to lead declarer’s suit. You do have the potential to establish tricks in Hearts, but declarer has five of them so the risk of giving away a cheap trick to the Jack is too great. It could easily be that Hearts is declarer’s source of tricks and you are doing his work for him. H x x is not an attractive holding to lead from, especially A x x or K x x, so you’re too likely to blow a trick by leading a minor suit. Best is to lead a passive Spade from x x x. Partner will have length behind the dummy a lot of the time, and you won’t be giving anything away that declarer can't take by force.

Your result so far:

A: ♥7. Again there’s little to gain by leading dummy’s suit when you’re the one with the length and strength. It’s true you could set up some Spade tricks if partner has the Jack, or even the Ten if you lead a low one and declarer has an A J 9 guess at trick one, but that won’t be enough to break the contract. That could be a good plan if you had a tenace in declarer’s suit and want to get partner on lead to switch to a Club, but that’s not the case here. You probably won’t be able to take many Spade tricks, and may just end up giving something away in the process. Try the ♥7 lead, second-highest from poor suits (usually lacking an honor). You stand to establish some Heart tricks by length even if partner doesn’t have a great deal there.

Your result so far:

A: ♥2. It’s not a good idea to lead declarer’s suit when you hold just low cards, because you’ll just be picking up partner’s honors there. Nor is a Spade lead a good proposition, since you’re the one with the length. It’s between the rounded suits, and a Heart rates to beat the contract more often because the opponents haven’t investigated a Heart fit, whereas they likely wouldn’t want to look for a Club fit even if they had one. Therefore partner is likely to have Heart length. Leading from Q x x is dangerous but it will establish a trick whenever partner has the King, and it will put you on the way to setting one up when he has the Ace or Jack.

When considering whether to lead one of the opponents’ suits, remember that you generally want to lead through the bidder, and it’s much more attractive to do so when the length and strength is behind the bidder. Remember that old adage: “lead through strength, around to weakness”.

Your result so far: