Contract Bridge

The natural tendency in bridge is to win a trick when the opportunity presents itself. However, there are occasions when it is better to refuse a trick than win it. This is especially true in defending against suit contracts when declarer ruffs with a card that a defender can overruff. Quite often, the best defense in such a situation is to discard and hope to gain an extra trump trick by doing so.

Here is a typical case. South is declarer at three clubs, and West finds the best lead of a diamond. East wins with the ten and continues with the K- A-J, West discarding a spade on the third diamond.

Declarer follows suit to the first three diamonds but is awkwardly placed on the fourth round. In the actual deal, South goes down regardless of which card he ruffs with — assuming West defends correctly — but let’s say that declarer ruffs with the ten.

If West overruffs — as he might do if he is a believer in taking tricks whenever possible — South makes the contract. East’s queen of clubs later falls on dummy’s ace, and declarer’s K- 9 then take care of West’s remaining 8- 6.

But if West is well- schooled in the art of defense, he discards a second spade when South ruffs the fourth diamond with the ten. Declarer eventually loses two trump tricks and goes down one.

West discards at trick four because he sees that there is nothing to be gained by overruffing the ten. He is sure to make at least one trump trick later on with his J- 8- 6- 4, regardless of how the unseen clubs are distributed. At the same time, West reasons that he may gain an extra trick, depending on his partner’s trump holding, by simply discarding after South ruffs with the ten.