Defense in Bridge is never easy. It needs a sustained concentration and a logical assumption of possible card distribution that could produce the most optimum result for the defense. Often defenders lose sight of the overall position and hastily cash in on the opportunity seized more in apprehension that they may not get another such opportunity. But there is more to it in Bridge defense.
Often a line chosen by one defender is temporarily ignored by another who has worked up a better strategy to gain more. This often cause some frustration initially between the defenders and if they don't hold on to their patience and tenacity, the initiative slip from them and the defense is lost primarily because of the lack of trust.
Hence in bridge, the most rewarding aspect of defense is to place the trust on each other and have the faith to know that both are working for the same cause, each from it own perspective that at first may not be too visible at the outset. For primarily the dummy cards open before both defenders is really the indicator and the key to tell which way the defense is heading. A successful defense rests on key assumption based on logical reasoning with sound judgment to assess the declarer's distribution along with his vulnerable suits. On strong bidding by the opponents, generally the defense is active especially of the declarer has a side suit to run. In the more hesitant bidding, defense generally remains passive for rich harness as the declarer has to find tricks all by himself with no clue to the distribution and the key cards.
Today's illustration is a classic case of defense, which needs to be well chalked out to defeat declarer's part game contract of 2H doubled by west on the following board after east had opened and west had bit 1NT, which when passed out to south, the latter decided to compete with 2H, which west doubled and led the 7 of spades and we now put you in east's chair holding the following hand with the dummy spread on your right as under:
As east how do you plan this defense to defeat 2H, doubled by your partner? The first inference is that with partner holding at least 4 hearts to declarer's five and the 7S lead being an obvious singleton, partner's likely holding for his 1NT overcall would be a 4-4-4-1 hand with about 8-9 points. With one of the top honours in trumps - either K or A with partner. So that he can get at least 2 trump tricks if not 3 long with 2 sides aces. The doubling tricks would rest on west's holding in the minor suits. With KD visible in dummy, if he holds the queen along with the KC, that could cause some trouble for the declarer who was vulnerable.
When south's QS held the first trick and declarer pushed for the heart finesse of the king by playing the 10 to knock west's KH out, east awaited for the club shift that he wanted. Can you guess why and how? Because I am sure you must have also indicated for a club shift by playing the lowest spade card on the first trick - 4S. That's what alert defense requires. West surely shifted to 4S eager to get partner's entry for a spade ruff. But when east after taking AC played back a club instead of giving west his spade ruff, west felt a bit disappointed but placing his trust on partner he did not lose faith. On winning KC, he immediately gave a club ruff to his partner who now was in a perfect position to start the cross ruff giving a spade to west for a ruff and to get another club ruff for east who after cashing KS on which declarer pitched a diamond did not fall in haste to play another spade. The expert defense was to cash AD before leading a spade to promote his partner's 9S for 4 off + 1100 and the prize for the best defended hand in a European Championship.
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Dummy You (East)
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QJ952 K10864
2 J76
K542 A109
K72 A3
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