In Bridge there are several techniques, gadgets aimed to outwit your opponents. One of them available to both the declarer and the defending partners is deception, by false carding to lure the declarer or the defender from the right course of play by deliberately giving him the wrong information regarding high points as well as distribution.
It is undoubtedly a handy technique but one fraught with a great deal of risk too. For while attempting to deceive your opponent by a false card technique, you take the big risk of getting your partner deceived too if he is unable to fathom your thought process and effort to deceive.
Let us learn by example taken from the semi-final hand of the olympiad at Deauville 1968, which ultimately assisted the Americans to defeat the Dutch and surge ahead into the final. Let us begin by giving you the west hand and the dummy (north) in a contract bid as under:
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S W N E
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1H P 1S P
3D P 3S P
3NT P 6H P
Pass All pass
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West led 7C from this hand to see the following dummy:
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North
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A K 10 8 7 4
1065
-
K J 10 5
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West
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3 2
A 8 7 4 3
10 6 4 3
7 3
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The contract was 6H to be played by south. Playing the 4C from dummy and deuce from east, south cashed the AC and ruffed a low diamond in dummy with east dropping the 9D to show even distribution of 4 cards. The 10H from dummy held the next trick west ducking and taking the AH next, while east discarded 5 and 4 of clubs.
The question here for my readers is that if in west's seat, what should you play next defending 6H contract? You know from the bidding that declarer holds 5 hearts and 5 diamonds. He played the AC on the 7C led from dummy, which presuming to be probably a lone AC leaves him with 2 spades to complete the declarer's distribution.
What does that implicate for your partner's distribution? Obviously void in hearts, gives him 4 diamonds already shown and the odd club card showing odd distribution of 5 leaving him with 4 spades. So the best plan for west should be what? Logically speaking west should try to cut him off from dummy as early as possible by playing spades to remove the spade entry, for declarer would then have to come to hand by ruffing a club which would suit west fine for trump promotion. Having thought it out, let's say you play a spade as did the defender at the olympiad the spade 2.
South's hand was as under:
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J
K Q J 9 2
A Q 8 7 2
A Q
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Thinking that the only chance in making 6H lay in playing low for the JS spades to be a winner, as the 2S suggested west had led from the queen, south play low from dummy east could now down the contract holding.
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Q 9 6 5
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K J 9 5
9 8 6 5 2
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But you see deceptions have its own pitfalls, west's 2S may have been a good false card to deceive south but it also deceived east who also placed the JS with his partner and therefore played the 9S much to the delight of south. The contract was now secure. All south now needed to do was to draw trumps and overtake the queen of clubs to run his clubs.
At the other table of course, the contract went one down, all because the Dutch west was trying to be too clever at deception. But in Bridge when you try to fool the opponents, you never know who is fooling whom?
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