The Crossruff
The crossruff is a too often ignored strategy for bringing your contract home, I would say. Drawing trump is a fine idea, and to be sure, there are always a few who manage to go down in a cold contract because they can't be bothered with that elementary task. And I would say, yes, your orientation should be toward drawing the opponents' trump in a prompt manner. Nevertheless, the situations you face won't always be resolved in quite such an elementary manner, and it behooves declarers to note the possible downside to a quick drawing of trump. There are a number of reasons for not drawing trump in such a quick manner -- discussed here -- the most obvious and elementary one being that you've got to get ruffs in the short trump hand, which you're not going to get by drawing trump quickly. I even mentioned on one hand that I'd been coming across a lot of hands recently where the 5-4 trump holding would have made the hand a piece of cake on a 2-2 split, but a number of declarers were going down on the 3-1 splits. And a close cousin to getting a few ruffs in the short hand is the full-blown crossruff, where you cash most, and occasionally all your trump separately. That's often the name of the game, just as on defense, the Uppercut is often the name of the game, not necessarily cashing, but using your trump separately.
When do you want to embark on a crossruff? Well, I would cite three criteria that make it appealing, to wit: (1) The distribution that invites it, to wit a shortage in one suit in one hand and a shortage in another suit in another. (2) A close second in importance, if not tied for first, is having a goodly supply of top trump, say down to the 7, missing one perhaps, though of course that's not set in concrete. (3) And thirdly, you want to be able to cash out your side suit winners off the top. If you have, for instance, a 5-3 side suit headed by the K Q J, you could cash only one winner, at best, before trump were drawn, and that'd be throwing away a lot of potential on a crossruff. But in the examples to be given, you'll note that side suit winners can be cashed with near impunity before trump are touched.
And fourthly -- well, I don't know whether to call this a criterion or a strategy -- count! Count the winners you have reason to expect. Do they add up to your contract? So here's the scoop:
You have one winner for every trump you hold minus one for every time trump are led when both hands have trump and one for every ruff that is overruffed. So if you're missing the ace, for instance, on a 5-4 holding, but have everything else down to the 7 and a little one in each hand, you would figure on 7 trump winners on the crossruff, i.e., nine minus one for the ace and one for a trump lead. That defender who overruffs won't necessarily lead a trump or be able to, but you've gotta figure by likelihood. Further, if you get to the last trump in that hand before the overruff, then a trump lead doesn't cut down on your 8-trick potential. And for other situations, you can work out how many winners you can expect. So I would say be on the alert for those first two criteria. When you see that distribution and all lovely top trump, you might wanna think crossruff!
Here is a link to a listing of illustrations.