Assume that South deals all 52 cards, one at a time, to all four players until all the cards are dealt .That leaves each player with 13 cards. West, the player to the left of the dealer, starts the play by playing any one of his 13 cards. Each player tries to beat the card that was lead, until all four players have played to the Opening Lead (the first card lead). These four cards are called a Trick, and the player who plays the highest card in the suit led, wins the trick. The winner of trick 1 earns the right to lead to the next trick. This continues until 13 rounds of four cards each have been played. The player who takes the greatest number of tricks on each deal wins.

·       Given the goal of establishing and then taking more tricks than his opponents, what suit should West lead, and why? Should he consider his hand good, bad or neutral for making the opening lead?

·        Can you see the two most disastrous cards for West to lead ? The second worst must be the Ace of Clubs- his only sure entry to his hand. The worst lead would be the Spade King, which would be beaten by the Ace and deprive him of his possible entry-as well as costing him a trick!
 

 ·      The worst part of West leading either card is that he is failing to establish his longest suit for 5 sure winners, while helping his opponents to establish their lower ranking black suit cards.

So far, we have talked about Whist as a solo game, with each player out to win tricks for himself.

Bridge, however, is only played as a partnership game. It will prove very useful, as you prepare to play Bridge to practice playing partnership Whist.  You and your partner- the player across the table from you- are going to work together to take more tricks than your opponents, the other partnership. I urge you to practice playing partnership Whist as you continue to learn Bridge.

Playing Solo, we discussed that you should play any card in your own best interest: if it fooled your three opponents, so much the better.

When playing with a partner, it becomes imperative for you to communicate accurately what you hold: for example, we noted that when playing for himself, it made no difference which Diamond West led, King-9, as all those Diamonds were equal.

 Playing with a partner, West needs to find a way to communicate the nature of his Diamond holding. In Bridge, this is accomplished by having the agreement that one leads the top card of a connected Honor sequence: thus, the correct opening lead is the Diamond King, which guarantees possession of the Diamond Queen and either the Jack or ten of the suit. Thus, partner knows, upon seeing the King at trick 1, that you have a long good Diamond suit headed by at least the KQ10.

While playing Bridge, you and partner will learn to have many such agreements, but for the moment, the one other agreement you should practice while playing partnership Whist, is the way to tell partner you like or dislike a given suit.

Using the example of West’s opening lead of the Diamond King, suppose East, his partner, holds the 932 of Diamonds and wants to tell West that he doesn’t like Diamonds and has no help for partner in the suit. The standard agreement at Bridge, which works equally well at Whist, is that: A high spot card encourages and a low spot card discourages. East, therefore, plays the 2 of Diamonds to tell West that he has no help for partner in Diamonds. This agreement extends to all situations where a player has an opportunity to inform partner of his attitude in any specific suit.

For example once West has dislodged the Ace of Diamonds and regained the lead with the Club Ace, he will cash his five Diamond winners. On the lead of the fourth Diamond East becomes void, and must make a discard: play a card in any other suit when out of the suit led.

This is East’s first opportunity to tell West his attitude about a remaining suit;assume that his only Honor card is the Ace of Spades, and that his entire Spade holding is: A 9742. What is the correct spot card for him to play in order to tell partner that he likes Spades? The 9: the highest Spade he can afford to play without it costing a trick. Now assume that East’s spades are 9742: how does he signal partner that he hates Spades: by playing the 2, the lowest Spade in the deck!

So far, we have established that both Whist and Bridge are often played in the condition called No Trump, in which all suits are equal and the highest card played in the suit led always wins.

There is a second condition of play in both games, called a Trump contract. In Lesson 2, you will learn how, in each hand at Bridge, it is determined whether the hand will be played in No Trump or in a Trump contract.

In a Trump contract, the lowest trump beats the highest card played in any other suit. As in No Trump, a player must follow suit unless void in the suit led, at which point the 2 of trump beats the highest card played in any other suit. I suggest you alternate playing hands in No Trump and then in a trump suit. For now, the easiest way to determine the trump suit is to pull the top card of the idle deck: that suit will be the trump suit for that hand.

Conclusion

In Chapter 2, to be published by the end of November, we will make the transition from Whist to bridge. You will learn about the way it is decided which pair will play the hand and which hand will defend, the ranking of the suits and how they relates to how the game is scored. Further, you will the difference between balanced and unbalanced hands and how to evaluate their respective trick taking potential.

In brief, I expect that by the end of Lesson 2 you will replace practicing Whist with practicing playing Bridge!

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