Research has increasingly focused on play as a social rather than a solitary domain. Play is a stage on which conflicts and wishes may be expressed to a responsive and containing other. As a group, late-adopted latency children show high levels of inhibition, regression and catastrophe in play, and adoptive parents may find this hard to engage with. The current study undertook a qualitative analysis of transcripts from groups run in the development of an adoption-specific parenting programme that emphasises play as a form of communication. Results indicate that adoptive parents habitually coped with play using counterproductive strategies that were predominantly avoidant or controlling; the programme facilitated some suspension of these defences. These findings are discussed with reference to children in therapy and individual work with their parents, who may be enabled better to support play through exploring their own conflicts and assumptions. (Contains 1 note.)