Читать книгу The Times Beginner’s Guide to Bridge - Andrew Robson - Страница 12

Bridge involves taking tricks. A trick consists of one card from each player. Each player holds 13 cards, making 13 tricks per deal. The more tricks you and your partner win, the better; your side needs to win a minimum of seven tricks in the deal in order to score points towards a game (see pp. 220–4 for more on the points required to make a game).

One player has the lead for each trick, i.e. he or she plays the first card of the trick. For the first trick, the player on lead is seated to the left of the dealer; for the next and later tricks it is the player who won the previous trick.

After the opening lead, the play proceeds in clockwise order. If you hold a card in the same suit as the first card of the trick then you must play it (‘follow suit’). If not, you can play any card of another suit: unless it’s a trump card (see p. 12), a card of a another suit will not win you the trick so you will generally ‘throw away’ a low card.

The highest card in the lead suit wins the trick. If a trump card is played to a trick led in another suit, the highest card of the trump suit – rather than the highest card in the lead suit – wins the trick. Whoever wins the trick leads to the next trick.

In the following example (a), East can choose any card to lead; he chooses ♥3. The other players must follow suit, i.e. play a card in the lead suit (hearts) – if they have a card in that suit. Play proceeds clockwise, with South playing second, West third and North last. West wins the trick and leads to the next trick.

A trick won by West

In the next trick (b), North plays the winning card, ♣Q. East, North’s opponent, plays a low card (♣4) because he doesn’t have a ♣K or ♣A to beat North’s ♣Q. South, on the other hand, would not waste a high card to overtake ♣Q because she is in partnership with North, who is already winning the trick.

The next trick is won by North

must know

Everything in bridge is done clockwise, for example, dealing and play proceed in clockwise order – and bidding too.