Page 32 - ABF Newsletter April 2025

TEACHING
TIPS
with Ian Dalziel
TEACHING DEFENCE
It is generally agreed that defence is the most difficult part of bridge. Do you realise that you spend more time defending than you do on any other part of the game? Improving your defence will not only give you better results, but, as you increase your knowledge, the defence becomes more interesting. You have ‘arrived’ as a defender when someone says to you at the end of the session, “Didn’t we have rotten cards today?” and you reply, “I honestly never noticed.”
Opening leads excepted, I would say defence is the hardest thing to teach. I find students learn much more from the prepared hands than from my spoken lessons, no matter how well I think I present the topic. Hence my spoken lessons on defence are usually quite short – 20 minutes at most.
Ian Dalziel is a teacher and regular columnist for “Mr Bridge” magazine in the UK, where this column was originally published.
The tricky bit is designing hands at the right level for the class. If they get most of the hands wrong, they become disillusioned – but if the hands are too easy, they don’t learn much. I do emphasise that the prepared hands are not a test or an exam – just a method of learning, and they can learn as much by getting them wrong as right.
My prepared hands have a designated contract which is to be defeated. Unless the topic is opening leads, the lead is specified too. They don’t bid the hands, as that takes far too long and they may not reach the desired contract. Of course, it is vital that defenders know how the contract was reached, so the bidding is shown in a large bidding spiral on the outside of my booklets (as shown). This makes the bidding easy to follow and it sits on the middle of the table during play. I know the bidding record should be withdrawn after the lead is made, but I make an exception.
The inside of the booklet shows the four hands and how they should be played (pictured). Declarer must play correctly or the defenders are not properly tested. If the contract fails due to declarer error and not best defence, then the teaching point of the hand is missed. Declarer, therefore, is given instructions in a little tent, which can’t be seen by the defenders, so the contract is only defeated if the defenders play correctly. Declarer isn’t being tested in this exercise, and is just making up the numbers.
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Ruff 7.
] J 9 x [xxx
} A K 10 x x {xx
] A x x
[ 9 x x x
}Jxxx }x {Ax {xxx
]K
[KQx }Qxx
{ K Q J 10 x x
] Q 10 x x x x [ A J 10
South to make 3{ on the [9 lead. EW to defeat it.
East wins the first trick with the [A.
The lead can’t be a singleton or doubleton as that would give declarer [KQxxxx or [KQxxx respectively, and South didn’t bid hearts.
East switches to his singleton diamond. West reads the switch as a singleton (why else would East lead to dummy’s good diamonds?) and gives East a ruff when in with the ]A.
East gets a second ruff by returning a spade, the only hope of getting West in. West can’t have a heart honour as the [9 must be top of nothing.
Australian Bridge Federation Ltd. Newsletter: April 2025