Quick summary

Remove enemy's leads in the danger suit.

Hold back your winner in the enemy's strong suit, until they can no longer lead it to eachother.

How many times should you duck ?

"Rule of 7" only works on a lead from a 5-card lead suit

So think about the likely split !

spadeheartdiamondclub

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Example Deal


«  1502  »

Communication - Ducking

The "rule of 7" only works if the lead is from a 5-card suit

In NT, if your enemy manages to establish a long suit, they could defeat your contract. If you play your only winner in that suit too early, then you might not be able to stop them.

When should you play your winner ?

Your goal is to stop your right hand opponent (RHO) leading back the suit to your LHO, who can then play out all his winners. So, you should play your winner in the same trick that your RHO uses his last card in this suit. If your RHO subsequently gets the lead, his communications will have been blocked off and you will be safe from this danger.

Mathematically, if your LHO has a 5-card suit, you can easily calculate how many time you neeed to duck: Count the number of cards you and dummy have in the suit, and subtract this from 7. The resulting is the number of times you must duck. This works equally well if the LHO leads to the RHO's long 5-card suit.

West leads Kspade. When should you play the Ace?

-West
spade K Q J 9 2
heart  
diamond  
club  
-North
spade 8 4
heart 
diamond 
club 
-East
spade 10 7 3
heart 
diamond 
club 
-South
spade A 6 5
heart 
diamond 
club 
 

+

<---- Click the "+" for the Answer



 

 

 

 

From a 4-card suit lead, your RHO will have one more card, and so you would have to hold up once more.

So, adjust the rule depending on the split you think you have against you.

 

spadeheartdiamondclub

 


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