How to Defeat Their Part Score

In this lesson:

Almost 42% of all deals are played in a part-score. 50% of the time, you will be on defense. Therefore, on a typical afternoon or evening duplicate game, you will be defending a part-score on 5 deals. I bet that is a lot more often than you will use Stayman or Jacoby Transfers or even make a Negative Double.

Despite this, very few books discuss how to defend a part-score. And since all knowledgeable authorities agree that defense is more difficult than declarer play, it is no wonder that so many defeatable contracts are allowed to succeed.

Eddie Kantar wrote: "At least half of your opponents' contracts can be defeated with a good defense, but the sad truth is that about eighty percent of them are fulfilled."

That may be true of your peers, but for those who study the techniques in the 15 deals in this lesson, you WILL DEFINITELY see a dramatic rise in YOUR batting average.

In this lesson, Marty will discuss:

• - How counting HCP can frequently enable you to find the killing defense
• - The great benefits of counting distribution and number of tricks
• - How to resolve the active vs. passive dilemma
• - How to destroy declarer's transportation
• - How to create trump tricks out of thin air
• - The correct time for an "alarm clock" lead
• - Why experts prefer "the simple defense"
• - How to improve your partnership defense

Here is an example of what Marty will discuss:

South opens 3♥ followed by 2 passes to you. As East, you choose to make a light balancing double. When partner leaves it in, you are far from sure that you've done the right thing. Your confidence does not increase when the dummy comes down and you see North's wealth of high cards.

You capture dummy's spade jack with your ace. Declarer follows with the 2. What should you lead at trick 2?

SOLUTION

With dummy's imposing spades and diamonds, there's no hope for any additional tricks in those suits. Partner must have a heart trick or two, but the rest of your tricks will have to come from clubs.

You need to find partner with the club ace to have any chance of defeating the contract. If declarer has exactly two clubs, you'll take your two club tricks and hope that partner can win two trump tricks.

If declarer has 3-4 clubs, the defense has a chance for three club tricks. But if you win both your club honors, cashing partner's club ace won't be easy. You'll try to reach him by leading a heart, but if declarer has the heart ace, he'll win it and get to dummy to discard his remaining clubs on dummy's winners.

What should you lead at trick 2?

You should lead the club queen! "Unusual situations require unusual solutions."

When your queen wins the trick, it will be obvious to partner that you have the club king. When you continue with that card, he'll know that you must have a reason to make such a strange lead. The only possible explanation for your leading the "wrong card" from your sequence is that you are trying to tell him you have a doubleton. He should overtake your king, give you a ruff and wait to score his heart king for a nervous but well-earned +200.

Here is the entire deal:

How would you play?