28th July – Board 8: Love All. Dealer West.
Some hands are just too hard to bid to the par contract but that doesn’t mean you should be a million miles away. On the hand shown below South should have tried to adopt a strategy which indicated he had a strong two-suiter, even if that meant biding his time for a while. I know the auctions were many and varied but something approximating to the following could not be criticised:
 |
West
|
North
|
East
|
South
|
1NT
|
No
|
2C
|
No
|
2H
|
No
|
No
|
4H
|
No
|
5C
|
No
|
5D
|
End
|
1NT is a sensible opening bid with the hearts too awful to wish to repeat but it does give his partner a problem. One solution might be to transfer to clubs in whatever way is available but I think a better idea would be to bid Stayman, aiming to pass a response in a major but to remove 2D to 3C. South should lurk as 2C is forcing but when 2H comes back to him he should come clean by bidding 4H, surprising everyone no doubt but clearly showing a two-suiter with spades and a minor. North would bid 5C in the expectation that his partner held spades and clubs and South would remove to 5D. It might seem a huge gamble but the reality is of course that North needs very little to make game viable. And as you can see a slam is cast iron, but that is just too hard.
Is the 4H bid, leaping michaels?
ReplyDeleteStewart
It's similar I suppose but in Leaping Michaels you always have the suit you bid. You have spades and not both minors because with those you would bid 4NT and bypass 4S. Of course that would be a strange bid in view of the pass over 2C. Maybe I'm being a bit of a Results Merchant - and it has been said before - but I would hate not to be in game with that South hand.
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