for Bridgewinners by Yuan Shen Feb. 18, 2015 
A short introduction to Slawinski-style leads
Caveat: I am careful to say “Slawinski-style”. I make a comment at the end regarding (my reading of) what Slawinski describes in his book.
I posted a brief summary of this elsewhere, but wanted to provide a more complete explanation followed by a few examples. I hope this article will be of interest to those interested in fine-tuning lead agreements, or curious about this particular style. Before moving on to Slawinski-style leads, let me list some common lead agreements, and what they hope to achieve. This context regards defending suit contracts.
1) Attitude-based leads, e.g. 2nd/4th.
Summary:
From xxx(x)(x), a negative-attitude lead of xXx(x)(x) is chosen. “A high card dislikes”. There are minor variants: for instance some people will lead the top of the sequence from (say) 87xx, instead of sticking by second-best.
From a suit that the leader likes, he will lead low, or 4th best from length, e.g. HxxX(x) or HxX.
There is ambiguity about length (count), but some accuracy regarding attitude.
The Polish extend this further and try low from a doubleton (leaf: when seeking a ruff). In the sense of an additional valuable trump trick, an xX lead “likes” the suit. In some ways, the Polish style is more consistent, but the American style has “high-low from a doubleton” ingrained (see below).
Note that a modern (European?) expert treatment is to lead 2/4th after trick 1, where attitude becomes much more important, particularly when switching to a new suit.
1-extra) Pure attitude leads are Wild Wild West-style (pick the card that you think shows how much you like your suit) — this is more often used against notrump contracts.
2) Count-based leads, e.g. 3rd/low.
You give (standard) count of your suit, which can be very useful when defending against suit contracts.
- X
- Xx (note from Hx, it always depends what you want to accomplish — whether you want to lead the honor as a pusher, or to force a slow trick with a possibly deceptive low lead, a la Rixi Markus.)
- xxX and HxX
- xxXx and HxXx
- xxxxX and HxxxX … and so on.
As in the prior case, there are numerous slight variants, e.g. 3/5th, or strict-count showing leads (high = even; low = odd). Such variants may or may not be an improvement.
Note that the inherent “count”-signalling choice of leading high from a doubleton is often grafted onto traditional “4th best leads” (or not-quite-2nd/4th leads, as I like to call it), as discussed above.
Slawinski-style leads (Yuan thinks Fantunes play these, but no guarantees).
- X, HX
- xX, HxX
- xXx, HxXx
- xxxX, HxxxX
- xXxxx, HxXxxx
- etc.
So as you see, it’s actually really simple. Obviously if you are dealt a God-given honor sequence, you abide by your honor-leading agreements.
The way to remember it is that without an honor (well you don’t like the suit, do you?), you give (upside-down) count.
If you do have an honor, and are leading low, you are still just giving UD count in your available spot cards.
Obviously, there’s two ways to give count (high-low = odd, or high-low = even). Why not use standard-spot-count? Well you just would not want to systemically lead X from HXx, would you? That would just be … stupid.
Let me provide a few simple examples of how to read these Slawinski-style leads in practice.
Example 1.
Partner leads the 5 against the opponents’ 2. Dummy shows up with the A-2, while you overcalled on a Q-9-6-4-3 suit (well you were a passed hand). Note that partner’s lead is the lowest possible spot, and as always, this adds further inferences.
What do you know? The missing honor is the king (for simplicity, I define the A-K-Q as relevant honors; the jack is too slow against a suit contract). Partner can’t have led the lowest possible spot from K-x-X-x, while we can throw out K-x-x-x-5 because partner didn’t sell out with a 10-card diamond fit. Also presumably partner does not have a J-10 sequence, so you can put one of those intermediates in declarer’s hand. Therefore, partner’s possible holdings are K-x-5 or x-x-x-5 (without both the jack and ten). When declarer rises ace, you can take a peek at the card declarer (lazily) follows with. Assuming declarer’s card is honest:
- if the 8-or-7 appears, then partner has led from K-J0-5 (jack-or-ten)
- If the J-or-10 appears, then partner has led from J0-8-7-5.
Example 2.
, and partner manages to find your suit, leading the 7.You now check the missing low spots — these are precisely the 6-3. Therefore partner cannot have led from a 5-card suit: from xXxxx, there has to be at least three missing spots lower than the 7; while from HxxxX, there is at most one outstanding low spot in declarer’s hand. In particular, declarer does not have a singleton club.
If you like (probably you should), you may insert the jack. The missing honor is the king: if declarer has it, that means partner has led from x7x; while if the jack holds, that means partner has Kx7x. How all this information affects the rest of the defence is, for the purposes of this article, irrelevant. But I hope you see that there are possibly useful inferences to be drawn.
Slawinski leads
I mentioned in my introduction that Slawinski himself suggested something slightly different. What I’ve described above can be summarised as count with-or-without an honor. The opening leader’s partner can make an educated guess (“If…”) concerning the leader’s general attitude, and depending on that, a putative count on the suit. Sometimes it’s a guess.
In Slawinski’s original text, he suggests attitude with-or-without an honor (which is something like the following):
- X, HX
- xX (like), HxX
- xXx (dislike), HxXx
- xXxx (dislike), HxxXx
- xXxxx (dislike), HxXxxx.
Actually I’ve failed to mention a main thrust of Slawinski’s book. He explains how to more accurately describe your holding based on your lead (X) and subsequent played-card (Y), e.g. you distinguish the following thus:
- Hxxx via: HxXY (play third best, then fourth)
- Hxxxx via: HxYXx
- Hxxxxx via: HxXxxY.
I think the gist is right if not the detail (probably someone will correct me). My own opinion is that against suits, you just don’t have the luxury of waiting for the second round, and that what I suggested at the top of this page works better in practice.