ACBL07T – Defense: Touching Honors Ward Trumbull
May 11, 2008
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Clarification
The term “Touching Honors” refers to multiple cards in a sequence,
Usually it is honors (10 thru ace) but not necessarily. As explained below, in some cases it could be such as 8-9-10.
Maxims
Defenders: Lead from high and follow from low.
Declarers: Lead from high and follow from high.
Gee, that means you only have one instance when you play low from a sequence. That is when you are a defender and someone else leads the suit. Wow, that is so hard to remember.
Defenders – Lead High from Touching Honors
On opening leads the rule is top of 3 against notrump but only 2 against a suit contract. After the opening lead, top of 2 is ok for either defender.
Defenders – Follow Low from Touching Honors
When declarer, dummy or partner leads a suit, and you are going to play one of the cards from a high sequence in that suit (touching honors); you should play the lowest card in that sequence. That is “Lower of Touching Honors”.
1. Partner, declarer or dummy leads an ace or facecard
Lower of touching honors would not apply. Just play low.
2. Partner, declarer or dummy leads a middle card
Lower of touching honors applies if your sequence is higher than
the card that was lead.
ACBL07T – Defense: Touching Honors May 11, 2008
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Defenders – Follow Low from Touching Honors (continued)
3. Partner leads a small card
This is a “Third Hand High” situation. Yes, you want to play the
lower of touching honors. Note however, that if you had something
like:
K J 10 9
you would play the king not the 9.
Example: Dummy You Defender
S – K J 5 S – Q 4 3 2
H – J 10 9 5 H – Q 4
D – Q 6 5 3 D – J 10 9 8
C – K 7 5 C – A 8 4
Partner leads the diamond 2, declarer plays the 3, you play the 8
and declarer plays the ace.
Your 8 says “I don’t have the 7 but may have higher touching
honors”. Partner should now question why the declarer didn’t take
the trick with the 9, 10 or jack. Answer: You have them.
Suppose you had played the diamond jack instead, not using the
touching honor feature. Now partner doesn’t know who has the 8, 9
and 10 of diamonds.
Note 1: How about if you have the ace and king in that lead suit?
Does it matter which one you play?
Yes – if you always play low from touching honors.
No - If you pick-and-choose when you’ll follow the maxim.
Will your partner remember when you do or don’t?
ACBL07T – Defense: Touching Honors May 11, 2008
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Defenders – Follow Low from Touching Honors
3. Partner leads a small card (continued)
Note 2: This doesn’t mean that you always play low from such
sequences when someone else leads a suit. There may be
a reason for you to just play low.
4. Declarer or dummy leads a small card
Normally, you want to play “Second Hand Low”. However,
remember the queen/jack rule. That is, if the dummy has the ace or
king, you might want to split those honors (play the jack) to be sure
you have a chance to get the queen.
Example: Dummy You Defender
S – A 9 5 S – Q J 3 2
H – J 10 9 5 H – Q 4
D – Q 6 5 3 D – J 10 9 8
C – K 7 5 C – A 8 4
Dummy leads the spade 5 and you play low (2). Then the declarer
plays the 10 from K 10 6, finessing your queen/jack. However, if you
had played the jack (lower of touching honors), declarer could not
have taken that finesse.
Declarer – Lead High from Touching Honors
This usually applies to declarer’s hand which the opponent’s can’t see.
You should tend to lead high from touching honors. The exception is a bit of declarer trickery. When you are in a suit contract missing the ace of trump, and it appears one opponent might be ready to ruff a side suit; declarer would like to have the opponent with the ace hold up one time. So the trick is to lead the queen or jack from such as jack-queen-king. If LHO has the ace, he/she might hold up thinking that his/her partner has the king.
ACBL07T – Defense: Touching Honors May 11, 2008
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Declarer – Follow High from Touching Honors
This also applies to the declarer’s hand. If you play the queen from
queen-king-ace, you are bragging that you have the higher honors in that suit. If you play high (in this case the ace), The defenders will hope that
their partner has one-or-both of those honors.