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I find it difficult to believe people who claim not to care whether they win or lose, as long as they enjoy themselves playing. I think every bridge player likes to win and hates to lose.
The way you win or lose plays a part as well though. Winning is particularly nice if you do it by pretty declarer play or defence. Winning as a result of blundering opponents is far less satisfying.
With losing, things are less straight forward. Getting beaten by technically superior opponents usually is bearable — though often it is hard to admit that they were better: regularly we come up with excuses like 'they were lucky with that slam succeeding on a finesse, while we were unlucky twice, going down in game because the trump suit split 4-1'. Often however, an objective analysis will show that good and bad luck were pretty evenly divided.
Really frustrating is losing after being taken for a ride by a wily opponent. Having fallen for his deceptive play, we will afterwards gracefully congratulate the wheeler-dealer (W-D) but internally we will curse him.
Take this deal from match point (MP) play (meaning overtricks are important):
| E/All | ♠ | A 8 4 3 | | | | ♥ | 9 3 | | ♦ | A J 9 6 | | ♣ | K 8 2 | | | |  | | | | | | | | | | ♠ | K 5 2 | | | ♥ | A K 5 | | ♦ | Q 8 5 3 | | ♣ | A 7 5 |
| West | North | East | South |
|---|
| — | — | pass | 1NT | | pass | 2♣ | pass | 2♦ | | pass | 3NT | pass | pass | | pass | | | |
West leads the ♥4 (fourth best), East plays the ♥Q. Declarer ducks and wins the return of the ♥10. West contributes the ♥2, so he began with five hearts.
(Aside: at IMP play — overtricks are relatively unimportant — declarer's intention is to take the best chance of making two extra diamond tricks. After all he has seven top tricks.
He begins with a small diamond to the ♦J.
- If it wins, the contract is safe: he continues with a small diamond to the ♦Q, ensuring a second extra diamond trick.
- If East takes the ♦J with the ♦K, declarer, after regaining the lead, will have to guess when playing the second diamond trick.
- Either he cashes the ♦A — failing only if East has started with the bare ♦K
- Or he cashes the ♦Q — failing only if East has started with four diamonds to the ♦K and ♦10.
In this case declarer will choose the ♦A: West has two more hearts than East.
If East turns out to have started with the bare ♦K after all, declarer has only a very small chance left: a 3-3 spade split— so East will have to have precisely 3-3-1-6 — and East must win the spade trick...)
However at MP play every trick counts. So declarer tries to make all four diamond tricks. In this case too he begins with a small diamond to the ♦J. But this time, if it wins and no special diamonds show up (!), declarer cashes the ♦A, hoping West has started with the ♦K doubleton.
So declarer begins with the ♦3 from South. West plays the ♦2, declarer inserts dummy ♦J and East contributes the ♦7.
At the moment he wants to play the ♦A, according to plan, declarer takes a closer look at East's card. The ♦7? If West, as declarer hoped, has started with the ♦K2, East has started with the ♦1074. Would he have played the ♦7 then? No, most players tend to follow suit with their lowest card. If that ♦7 is indeed East's lowest diamond, he probably started with the ♦107. In that case declarer can make four diamond tricks by crossing to his hand and advancing the ♦Q, pinning East's ♦10.
And if East's ♦7 was a singleton, declarer makes three diamond tricks this way (he would make only two if he were to cash the ♦A at the second diamond trick).
So declarer crosses to his hand and plays the ♦Q... | O/All | ♠ | A 8 4 3 | | | | ♥ | 9 3 | | ♦ | A J 9 6 | | ♣ | K 8 2 | | ♠ | Q 10 7 6 | | ♠ | J 9 | | ♥ | J 8 7 4 2 | ♥ | Q 10 6 | | ♦ | 2 | ♦ | K 10 7 4 | | ♣ | Q 10 3 | ♣ | J 9 6 4 | | | ♠ | K 5 2 | | | ♥ | A K 5 | | ♦ | Q 8 5 3 | | ♣ | A 7 5 |
...West showing out!
The disillusioned declarer ends up with two diamond tricks and down one, taken in by the W-D in East. Not only did he smartly duck the first diamond trick, he also played that diabolical, suggestive ♦7. (Or was he naïvely showing count? You know what they say: idiot and genius are neighbours...)
At most other tables East routinely wins the first diamond trick with the ♦K. Declarer wins the heart return and plays another diamond (from his hand; after all that's were he is...). On seeing West show out, he has no problem scoring three diamond tricks: he wins with the ♦A and finesses for East's ♦10.
A few East players duck the first diamond trick, but they do so by routinely playing their lowest, the ♦4. Declarer thus has no reason to abandon his original plan: at the second diamond trick he cashes the ♦A and here too East's ♦10 is a dead duck.
Why this is so frustrating? Because declarer has the feeling he can't do well!
- If he plays as described, he becomes the sucker if East is a W-D who plays that smart ♦7 from ♦K1074 (PS: a W-D in East will also play that card from ♦1074; if declarer falls for it and later advances the ♦Q from South, he makes only nine tricks, whereas other declarers will make ten).
- If he decides not to trust East's ♦7, he cashes the ♦A at the second diamond trick. He has thrown away an overtrick then if East genuinely had the bare ♦107 (and the contract if that ♦7 turns out to have been a singleton...).
Perhaps declarer does best to ignore a card like that ♦7 if he knows East to be a W-D. This way at least he isn't taken for a ride by East; he thus joins those declarers who never bother to note lowly cards like that ♦7... Let me change the diamond layout somewhat: | | ♦ | A J 8 6 | | | ♦ | K 4 | | ♦ | 10 9 6 | | | ♦ | Q 7 5 2 | |
South begins by playing the ♦2 to the ♦J. If East routinely plays the ♦6, declarer has no choice (in MP play that is): he continues with the ♦A: four diamond tricks.
If East is a W-D he knows what to do: to the first diamond trick he unhesitatingly drops the ♦9 (or the ♦10) under the ♦J. Now declarer has a choice. He may of course still play the ♦A next.
But if he thinks East has started with the singleton ♦9 or with the bare ♦109, he crosses to his hand and advances the ♦Q. Thereafter East is bound to score a well-deserved diamond trick.
I have to admit I have been the victim of a W-D more than once. This happened during a medium level MP league match, a long time ago:
| | ♦ | K Q 9 8 5 4 | | | | | | | | | | ♦ | A 2 | |
I declared 3NT. To my ♦A West followed suit with the ♦3 and East with the... ♦10! I played the ♦2, West contributing the ♦6.
I didn't know East, but he looked to me a respectable, unimaginative, point counting family man. In other words: he had very little of a W-D about him. So he wasn't the man to have played that ♦10 from ♦J107. That left only two possibilities: he had started with either the bare ♦10 or the bare ♦J10.
In that case the Principle of Restricted Choice applied: the chance that the ♦10 was a singleton was almost twice that of East having played it from the bare ♦J10. So I finessed and... found myself figuring in an article in the local rag (something like 'The sucker of the day' — yes, the journalist was a friend) and I still dream of it occasionally, since East had started with ♦J107!
In the next deal West is the W-D:
| N/All | ♠ | Q 5 | | | | ♥ | A 5 2 | | ♦ | Q 9 6 5 4 2 | | ♣ | 6 3 | | ♠ | 10 8 3 | | ♠ | 9 6 4 | | ♥ | K Q 8 | ♥ | J 10 9 6 | | ♦ | A J 7 | ♦ | K 10 8 3 | | ♣ | K 8 7 4 | ♣ | J 2 | | | ♠ | A K J 7 2 | | | ♥ | 7 4 3 | | ♦ | — | | ♣ | A Q 10 9 5 |
| West | North | East | South |
|---|
| — | pass | pass | 1♠ | | pass | 1NT | pass | 2♣ | | pass | 2♠ | pass | 3♣ | | pass | 4♠! | pass | pass | | pass | | | |
At IMP play North's 4♠ bid is too aggressive, at MP-play it's suicidal... But don't argue with success: since the trump suit is 3-3 and the ♣J comes down at the second round, it looks like South is easily going to make his contract.
West leads the ♥K. Declarer wins in dummy and plays a club to the ♣Q, mindful of the sound motto: develop the side suit as quickly as possible.
W-D West ducks without so much as twitching a muscle!
Declarer cashes the ♣A, noting East's ♣J. Next he plays a small club from hand, West following suit with the last small club that is still out. It is clear (!) that East has started with precisely ♣KJ2, so declarer proceeds to even make an overtrick: he ruffs with dummy's ♠5, expecting to see the ♣K coming down. After that he can cash the ♠Q, ruff a diamond, draw trumps (a 4-2 split doesn't pose a problem) and cash two more clubs.
But to declarer's astonishment East overruffs dummy at the third club trick and plays back a trump. Declarer now cannot avoid the loss of three more tricks — two hearts and the ♣K — for down one!
If West had done the normal thing, winning the ♣Q with the ♣K, EW would have scored two heart tricks but no more, so declarer would duly have made his contract.
An extreme wheeler-dealer, this West player. Still, this South player mostly has himself to blame. After all, we have seen that the contract was sky high; few NS-pairs will have been in game. Therefore South was bound to score well if he only made the contract. In such a situation it is ill-advised to hunt for the overtrick, even in MP-play. He should have realised that the contract was safe (barren a 5-1 trump break) at the moment the ♣J fell under the ♣A: all he had to do after that was to draw trumps and give up a trick to the ♣K.
All the more since he had a clue that something was fishy with those clubs: a W-D in East would, if he really had started with precisely ♣KJ2, have dropped the ♣K under the ♣A. That's another example of a play that doesn't cost and gives declarer a chance to go wrong!
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