By Val Rhead
Bridge is a “fun” game. However, it is more fun if you are successful at least some of the time. One of the strategies that helps make it successful is to remember that Bridge is a partnership game. You and your partner make up a team of two. You don’t make decisions based only on what is in your hand. The decisions you make are based upon the agreements you and your partner have with each other. Good communication between the two partners is essential.
For example, if you and your partner have an agreement that you will make an opening bid when you have 12 or more points in your hand, that is what you should do. This will include high-card points, and if you have a long suit, length points. For example, a six-card Heart suit will give you an extra two points, one for each of the fifth and sixth cards in the suit.
However, sometimes adjustments have to be made to the total point count. The point count changes as the bidding progresses. If the high-card point count includes a singleton Queen of Diamonds, a player may decide to deduct a point or even two points from the total. However, if the partner bids that suit, it becomes valuable, and can be added back into the total.
At the beginning of the bidding, you don’t give points for shortness. But once you and your partner have established a fit in a suit, declarer can add three points for a void, two points for a singleton and one point for a doubleton. The hand that will become dummy can add five, three or one point for the void, singleton or doubleton depending on the number of trump cards in the dummy’s hand. By this valuation, dummy would only add five points for a void if she had five trump.
Problems arise when players don’t adhere to their agreement. Your partner may decide that she doesn’t like her thirteen-point balanced hand, which has a four-card Diamond suit, and passes. Perhaps, she has forgotten that she has agreed to use the Better Minor Convention. This convention states that she can open the bidding if she has twelve or more points, with no five-card major suit, by bidding the better of her two minor suits. Sometimes, this means that she might have only three cards in the minor suit. If the next player passes, you look at your ten-point hand. It has also a four-card Diamond suit. But you can’t open the bidding, so you pass. Your partnership might have made a score of at least 110 which certainly beats zero. And maybe your four-card Diamond suit contains the Ace and King of Diamonds, but you couldn’t bid the suit. Your opponents get in with a Two-Spade bid. Your partner doesn’t know that a Diamond would be a good lead, and your opponents make their contract.
Your success at the Bridge table will be determined only partially by your skill at playing the hand. It will be determined also by the quality of the communication skills possessed and applied between you and your partner.
If you wish to promote an activity in your bridge group or ask a bridge question, send the information to vrhead23@gmail.com and I will try to include it in this column.
MID-WINTER LUNCH AND BRIDGE OR GAMES PARTY
CFUW-MUSKOKA BURSARY FUNDRAISER, ALL WELCOME
Lunch at 12 NOON Friday, Feb 15, 2019 $25 per person
Gravenhurst Senior’s Centre 480 First Street North
A fundraiser to assist young women in Muskoka attending Post Secondary Education.
Please register your foursome and bring supplies needed for your table. To register, please provide four names to Mary 705-646-8881 [email protected]
NEW SOCIAL BRIDGE GAME IN HUNTSVILLE
Games are at the Active Living Centre on Thursdays at 7 p.m. in the multi-purpose room 2nd floor (elevator) at the back entrance of the Canada Summit Centre. Just come – with or without a partner.
For information, please contact Donna or Peter Tikuisis at 647 471 1774 or [email protected].
For now, this game will be played following Chicago Rules (allowing both fast and slow games). You will keep your same partner for the entire evening. Cost is $1.50 per person. Parking is outside the North Entrance opposite Heritage Village Railway Station.
PORT CARLING SOCIAL BRIDGE CLUB
Games for the Port Carling Social Bridge Club are Monday afternoon 1pm at the Port Carling Community Centre, 3 Bailey Street. Please arrive with your partner at least 10 minutes before game time.
For information, contact Andree or Scott 705-764-3827 [email protected]
Winners for Monday, Jan 21st, 2019 1. Kathy and Jim Haller 4600; 2. Els Vandenberg and Peter Rhead 4580 very close; 3. Sue Daglish and Scott Staples 3100
HUNTSVILLE DUPLICATE BRIDGE CLUB
Games at the Huntsville Club are Tuesday afternoon 1pm, Trinity United Church 33 Main Street (side door, three steps up in the Hearth Room). Please arrive at least 15 minutes early. For information and partnerships call Liz Graham (705)789-7187 or email at [email protected]
The following winners are for Tuesday, Jan 22, 2019 with 6 pairs playing a Howell movement. 1. Liz Graham and Dorothy Russell; 2/4. Vern Foell and Rod Dixon; 2/4. Helen Pearson and Jim Smith; 2/4. Betty Fagin and Brian Brocklehurst
MUSKOKA DUPLICATE BRIDGE CLUB (Bracebridge)
Games for the Bracebridge Club are Mondays 7pm, Knox Presbyterian Church, 120 Taylor Road. Please arrive 15 minutes before game time. For information or partnerships, call Brian at 705-645-5340 [email protected]
The following winners are from Monday, Jan 21, 2019 with 9 pairs playing a Howell movement. 1. Helen Pearson and Jim Smith; 2. Liz Barnes and David Bryce; 3. Betty Fagin and Brian Brocklehurst; 4. Mary Luke and Donna McIntosh; 5. Frank Vagnoni and Gerry Lawrence
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