How to play bridge?(1)

After introducing a lot of things, I eventually want to talk about how to play bridge.

I should say again, bridge is a "trick-taking" game, so taking the tricks is the most important thing.

Let's learn how to play.

First, the contracts can be divided into two categories, trump and no-trump. The different is that if there is a trump contract, then the suit of trump are dominant in this game. If it is a no-trump contract, then the card led by the player determine the dominant suit in that trick. Today, I want to talk about how to win the tricks and play no-trump contracts.

Take this game for example. If you are sitting at South, and you are playing 5NT. How to play?

In fact, playing bridge is very very easy. The first step is counting how many tricks you can win.

In the no-trump contract, ace is a "winner", which means that ace can let you win a trick. And if you have ace, then K is a winner, too. If you have A and K, Q is a winner. However, it doesn't mean that if you have 8 top cards(AKQJT987), you can win 8 tricks. Why?

Look at the picture. How many tricks you can win in the spade? Five. You only have five spades in hand, and three on table, so you can only win 5 tricks. Now, count how many tricks can you
win in total? Can you make the contract?

ANS: 11,YES!