Issue 14 - Standard American

Editorial by Paul Bowyer

Welcome to the fourteenth issue of V-Blue, the e-magazine for those fresh to the wonderful game of bridge. Here, as usual, we have three excellent series for you.

Two series (of six deals each) are dummy play and focus on the play in suit contracts.

We are looking at what to do first - after you have studied the dummy and said “Thank you”, of course. Should you draw trumps? Should you go for a ruff in the dummy? Or is there something even more urgent to attend to?

So far, in suit contracts, we have only had two types of hand – those where you draw trumps and those where you delay drawing trumps until you have taken a ruff or two in the short trump hand. Now there appears to be a third hand type - one where you cash early winners before adopting either strategy.

Confused? Well, we are here to help.

The key indicator, as ever, is careful counting. You must count winners and losers. You have to understand the essential difference between fast losers and slow losers; once you do there will be no stopping you!

There are six straightforward hands in the first series and six slightly harder hands in the second.

When you have absorbed these very important lessons on playing the dummy you may care to play an assortment of deals in our “General Series”. Here there is a mixture of eight deals, some you play as declarer and some as a defender. All the fun of the fair - you don’t know what’s coming next. Don’t worry, though. Vu-Bridge is an imperturbable teacher, always by your side to give you hints, tips and wheezes of how to cope with the demands of this fascinating game.

You can further test yourself with our quiz - this time on the topic of rebidding as opener after your partner has responded with a suit bid.

There’s plenty here for you to get your teeth into. Good hunting and good luck.

Series #2385 - Timing - What to do first? - Part I (SA version)

The secret of good comedy is – timing! And this holds true for bridge, also.

This series, and another also in this edition, is all about the timing of the hand – What to do first. When playing in a suit contract usually there are two main ways to get rid of losers. We can trump them in dummy (in the short trump hand). Or we can dump them in dummy, on dummy's long suit. The question becomes, do we draw trumps now or later?

Were life so simple! In fact, there are a lot more things than that we have to think about and this series shows you how important planning the order of your tricks is.

Series #2385 - Timing - What to do first? - Part I (SA):

Opener's Rebids (Unbalanced Hands) Quiz

In the last quiz we looked at opening bids followed by a rebid in No-trumps.

Here we are looking at how to plan the bidding of a hand that is not balanced and is going to bid a suit (or suits).

Click here to run the Quiz.

Series #2386 - Timing - What to do first? - Part II (SA version)

This is the second series all about What to do first. When playing in a suit contract usually there are two main things to consider – do we draw trumps or do we aim to trump losers in the dummy (in the short trump hand)?

However, when we count too many losers we may have something even more important to think about first. Should we be looking to dump losers and - if so - where?

Some of the deals in this series bring in the idea of tempo. You have to get your tricks going before the opponents get theirs. Many hands become races between the two sides and you have to make sure you win that race.

Series #2386 - Timing - What to do first? - Part II (SA):

Series #2811 - General Hands (SA):