Andrew Robson - The Times Improve Your Bridge Game

HarperCollins Publishers

Westerhill Road

Bishopbriggs

Glasgow

G64 2QT

Second edition 2018

www.harpercollins.co.uk

© 2005, 2014, 2018 Andrew Robson

The Times is a registered trademark of Times Newspapers Ltd

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

If you would like to comment on any aspect of this book, please contact us at the given address or online.

E-mail: puzzles@harpercollins.co.uk

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

Ebook Edition © JULY 2014 ISBN 9780008285609

ISBN 9780008285586

Version: 2018-07-31

Find out more about HarperCollins and the environment at www.harpercollins.co.uk/green

Cover

Title Page

Copyright HarperCollins Publishers Westerhill Road Bishopbriggs Glasgow G64 2QT Second edition 2018 www.harpercollins.co.uk © 2005, 2014, 2018 Andrew Robson The Times is a registered trademark of Times Newspapers Ltd A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. If you would like to comment on any aspect of this book, please contact us at the given address or online. E-mail: puzzles@harpercollins.co.uk All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books. Ebook Edition © JULY 2014 ISBN 9780008285609 ISBN 9780008285586 Version: 2018-07-31 Find out more about HarperCollins and the environment at www.harpercollins.co.uk/green

Introduction INTRODUCTION This is one of the few Bridge books aimed at the social or less experienced player, as opposed to the tournament player. If you long to improve, but find yourself repeating the same mistakes and perhaps not even knowing that they are mistakes, then this book is for you. In the short opening section, ‘The Game’, I set out the keys to holding your head up high at the Bridge table. Incorporated into each of the three subsections – Bidding, Declarer Play, Defence – are all the tips. Each tip is numbered, enabling you to cross-reference it with the relevant deal in the main body of the book. The pages that follow are based on my Friday column in The Times , entitled ‘Common Mistakes for the Less Experienced’. Each page contains an instructive deal and a salutary lesson: what happened when the hand was played at the table, and what should have happened. The analysis ends with the numbered tip. You can read ‘The Game’ first, in its entirety. Or you can flick back and forth from the numbered tip in ‘The Game’ to its deal in the main body of the book. Alternatively you can pick a deal at random, with the option of cross-referencing each tip in ‘The Game’. I hope you enjoy the book and find it instructive. If you are not a regular Times reader, you can access my daily column from The Times online www.timesonline.co.uk . For more information about myself and my Bridge School in South West London see www.andrewrobson.co.uk .

The Game THE GAME Bridge is the most widely played game in the world, and surely the best. It is endlessly fascinating at whatever level it is played, from complete beginner up to world champion. Even experts never truly conquer the game – a blessing, or Bridge would go the way of Noughts and Crosses. As if to emphasize this, Computer Bridge is lagging behind Computer Chess or Backgammon. The skills required to be a top Bridge player are so many and varied. A microcosm of life, Bridge combines competition (against the opponents) and co-operation (with partner). Perhaps the single most important joy of the game is this partnership element. From the moment you pick up your 13 cards to form your ‘hand’, you try to convey messages to partner about it. This communication of information in the first phase of the game – the bidding (or auction) – leads to one partnership (the one making the final – higher – bid) contracting to make a designated number of tricks in their chosen trump suit. Then the play begins – will they prevail, or will they be prevented from achieving their trick target? A few minutes later, a totally new deal begins and with it a whole new set of challenges.

The Deals:

Bidding

Declarer Play

Defence

Index

About the Publisher

This is one of the few Bridge books aimed at the social or less experienced player, as opposed to the tournament player. If you long to improve, but find yourself repeating the same mistakes and perhaps not even knowing that they are mistakes, then this book is for you.

In the short opening section, ‘The Game’, I set out the keys to holding your head up high at the Bridge table. Incorporated into each of the three subsections – Bidding, Declarer Play, Defence – are all the tips. Each tip is numbered, enabling you to cross-reference it with the relevant deal in the main body of the book.

The pages that follow are based on my Friday column in The Times , entitled ‘Common Mistakes for the Less Experienced’. Each page contains an instructive deal and a salutary lesson: what happened when the hand was played at the table, and what should have happened. The analysis ends with the numbered tip.

You can read ‘The Game’ first, in its entirety. Or you can flick back and forth from the numbered tip in ‘The Game’ to its deal in the main body of the book. Alternatively you can pick a deal at random, with the option of cross-referencing each tip in ‘The Game’.

I hope you enjoy the book and find it instructive. If you are not a regular Times reader, you can access my daily column from The Times online www.timesonline.co.uk . For more information about myself and my Bridge School in South West London see www.andrewrobson.co.uk .

Bridge is the most widely played game in the world, and surely the best. It is endlessly fascinating at whatever level it is played, from complete beginner up to world champion. Even experts never truly conquer the game – a blessing, or Bridge would go the way of Noughts and Crosses. As if to emphasize this, Computer Bridge is lagging behind Computer Chess or Backgammon. The skills required to be a top Bridge player are so many and varied.

A microcosm of life, Bridge combines competition (against the opponents) and co-operation (with partner). Perhaps the single most important joy of the game is this partnership element. From the moment you pick up your 13 cards to form your ‘hand’, you try to convey messages to partner about it. This communication of information in the first phase of the game – the bidding (or auction) – leads to one partnership (the one making the final – higher – bid) contracting to make a designated number of tricks in their chosen trump suit. Then the play begins – will they prevail, or will they be prevented from achieving their trick target? A few minutes later, a totally new deal begins and with it a whole new set of challenges.