View source for Avoidance play

{{Short description|Contract bridge play technique}}
In [[contract bridge]], '''avoidance play''' is a play technique whereby declarer prevents a particular defender from winning the trick, so as to eschew a dangerous lead from that hand. The dangerous hand is usually the one who is able to [[finesse]] through declarer's honors, to give a ruff to the partner or to cash one or more established winners.<ref>{{OEB|6|31}}</ref> Avoidance play can be regarded as one type of [[safety play]].

==Example==
{{BridgeHandNS
|A&thinsp;J&thinsp;9&thinsp;6|7&thinsp;5&thinsp;2|10|A&thinsp;Q&thinsp;J&thinsp;10&thinsp;2
|K&thinsp;10&thinsp;8&thinsp;4|Q&thinsp;8&thinsp;4|A&thinsp;9&thinsp;6&thinsp;5|K&thinsp;3}} South plays 4{{Spades}} and West leads {{Hearts}}K (indicating the ace), East playing the 3 ([[signal (bridge)|signal]]ling the odd number of hearts and discouraging the continuation). West continues with a club, increasing the probability of defensive ruff in that suit.

The declarer has plenty of tricks, but is missing the trump queen and two top hearts; giving up the third heart early would probably mean losing the contract. Since {{Hearts}}A is almost certainly with West, if East gets the trump queen, he could finesse declarer's {{Hearts}}Q. Thus, the declarer must not allow East to get the trick, and so must play a trump first and finesse against the queen in East's hand. If West has the {{Spades}}Q and takes it, he could only take one more heart trick.

Note that, even if South had a fifth trump instead of a diamond (playing in 5-4 fit), the same technique—finessing the queen against East—would practically ensure the contract (safety play). If the trumps are distributed x—Qxx, the [[percentage play]] of playing AK in trumps would endanger the contract, as East could ruff a later round of clubs with {{Spades}}Q and play a heart through. With the avoidance finesse, West could win a "non-existing" trump trick if the trumps were distributed Qx–xx, but could not set the contract.
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==References==
{{reflist}}

{{WPCBIndex}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Avoidance Play}}
[[Category:Contract bridge card play]]