I was 9 years old and still wore the Velcro shoes of shame. People tried to teach me the proper way to tie shoelaces; I had heard dozens of variations of bunnies chasing tails down holes, dogs following each other, and myriad other animals contorting themselves into knots. There are many ways to lace shoes correctly, and I was doing none of them.

Finally, someone showed me a diagram (I’m sure there’s a better YouTube video now) of how a knot worked and that’s when it actually clicked for me.

As a bridge teacher, I used to worry about repeating myself. I quickly realized, however, that in order to learn something, students need to hear each point multiple times. It also helps to hear those points repeated in a slightly different manner as the exact words to unlock a concept vary from person to person.

As an example, defense is a complicated topic. It can tie us in knots [sorry--I couldn’t resist]. There are many ways to try to defend.

Some try to follow rules like: “second hand low, third hand as high as necessary,” or “cover an honor with an honor.” Those work generally, but might fail on a specific hand.

Maybe big picture thoughts are more your style, like “If declarer is trying to do one thing, you should do the opposite,” or, “Try to figure out if it’s a passive defense deal or an aggressive defense deal.”

Alternatively, you could try the consistent approach (my favorite), and figure out what you know during the auction and when dummy comes. Then you can start to form a picture of what partner has in high cards and distribution. As the deal continues, you will be filling in this sketch. This method takes practice and patience to master.

Whatever the method, you should always try thinking through as clearly as possible about “why” a particular defense is called for.

Take a look at this deal:

You are West, EW Vul, Matchpoints. You hold:

KQ1043
A10
K84
J103

The auction starts with 1NT on your right. Do you bid?

Please don't! You need a better hand than this to get involved in direct seat on the 2-level after a 1NT opener. You should have a decent 6-card suit (or a two-suited hand). Bidding 2 here is begging to go for a big number. After you pass (and continue passing), the full auction is:

West (You)	North	East	South
			1NT
Pass	2	Pass	2
Pass	3NT	All Pass

With this spade honor sequence (KQ10 is a two and a half-card sequence), we lead the top of the touching cards. That means we will lead the K and see this dummy:

Vul:EW Dlr: S	DUMMY AJ5 8765 Q732 K5
KQ1043 A10 K84 J103

Not the dummy you were hoping to see, perhaps. Declarer thinks (and so should you), and eventually plays the 5. Partner plays the 6 (standard attitude), and declarer plays the 2.

What next?

We should continue spades! Yes, declarer is entitled to two spade tricks, and we could rely on our "don't switch suits" motto or we could do the work.

Declarer has 15-17 points and no 4-card major. We have 13 points. Dummy has 10 points. That leaves partner with a queen at most. We're not about to beat this by trying to find partner's strength. We might just have enough tricks on our own: three spades, a heart and a diamond. We need to work on those spades to get three tricks, though.

There's another saying, "Render unto Caesar [declarer] that which is Caesar's". Declarer can always finesse your spades, so you might as well let declarer have them now and work on setting up the spade for the future.

You play a second spade. [Advanced note: This card should be a suit preference signal since you could play any of your spades. Partner isn't likely to get in on this deal so it is probably moot on this deal]. What happens next will depend on declarer (and the exact layout).

On this deal, Declarer plays a heart to the J next. What do you do?

Win and knock out that last spade. No reason to duck here. You hope your K or J will allow you back in later. Look at the full deal:

Vul:EW Dlr: S	AJ5 8765 Q732 K5
KQ1043 A10 K84 J103		86 9432 965 9642
	972 KQJ AJ10 AQ87

Declarer has 8 tricks, but no way to get a 9th without finessing diamonds. Partner has a 0-count, but a very important role on this deal. When you play a third spade, does it matter which small card partner plays?

Absolutely! If partner discards anything other than a diamond, declarer will make! The beauty of bridge is that even when we have no face cards (or even 10s!), we might have to make good decisions. Here, East should follow the "rule" of keeping length with dummy in hearts and a similar thought should stop East from throwing a club in case declarer has four of them. East's diamonds aren't helping.

If you switched to anything at trick two, declarer will make at least 9 tricks and probably an overtrick or two (two spades, two hearts, three diamonds and three clubs to start). However you find yourself continuing spades at trick two, keep doing that.

One last note: declarer might have tried either diamonds or hearts at trick three. Diamonds is better if East has the ace of hearts, but playing hearts first gives declarer the chance of a 3-3 heart split in addition to the diamond finesse. It's a close call.