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How often, after being euchred, have you heard someone say, "But I had three trump, two suited, I couldn't turn it down." No, you should never turn it down. This is a very playable hand. However, to be successful the hand must be played correctly.
Three-trump, two-suited hands fall into two basic categories: the ones where you hold an off-suit ace and the ones that you don't. Each hand must be played slightly different. Let us look at each type separately.
By choosing the correct method, you will reduce your chance of being euchred and sufficiently increase the chance of making a point.
The more common hand is the one where you don't hold an off-suit ace. The basic strategy is to rid the opposition of their trump and promote the high card in your off suit.
This is a typical three-trump, two-suited hand. The dealer is in the South position. Many players would pass here, not seeing a possible point. Yet, this hand, when played properly, is a point maker.
The dealer has turned up a king of spades. He also holds two other spades in his hand. Bidding is passed around and back to the dealer. Seizing the opportunity to make a point, the dealer (S) picks up the king.
East seat starts the hand by trying to make their ace of diamonds good. North seat follows the diamond lead as does West. The maker (S) trumps in with the 9. One trick for the maker and one trump has been played.
Next the maker (S) turns its focus to setting up its off-suit. This is done by leading the smaller of the two off-suit hearts, the idea is to make the king of hearts boss. West follows suit with the ten of hearts. The maker's partner (N) tries to capture the trick with the ace, but West trumps in with the ace. The king is now the boss card in hearts. 2 Trump have been played and both teams have one trick. So far things are going as planned.
Then East leads the ace of clubs, this gives the maker (S) a chance to trump in. Everyone else follows suit. So far three trump have been played. The maker's team now has two tricks.
What the maker (S) is hoping will happen next is that one of the opponents will use their trump on the second off-suit lead. Then, with a little luck, they will lead back something that will allow the maker (S) to use their third trump to take the last trick needed to make a point.
Everything goes as planned and the bidding team has made their call. This play will work most of the time. There may be times, depending on how the cards fall, when one will have to adjust the play on the last couple of tricks.
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