Trusting Partner

27^th March – Board 6: East/West Game. Dealer East.

Disappointingly no pair managed to reach the excellent grand slam on the hand shown but as long as you trust partner – sometimes a big ask! – it really should not have been too difficult.

	North: S 10 8 6 4 3 H Q 8 7 2 D 10 9 C K 7
West: S A K J H K 3 D A 7 6 5 4 3 C 6 4		East: S 5 H A J 10 6 4 D K Q J 2 C A 9 3
	South: S Q 9 7 2 H 9 5 D 8 C Q J 10 8 5 2

West	North	East	South
		1H	No
2D	No	3S	No
4S	No	5C	No
5H	No	7D	End

3S is a splinter agreeing diamonds and is game forcing and 4S and 5C show first round controls. 5H shows second round control and is clearly looking for the grand because his side are already committed to playing in at least 6D. Now East with his fantastic trump support and the ace of hearts, which as yet he hasn’t shown, can hardly do less than bid the grand. On a neutral lead declarer should set up the fifth heart in dummy for a club discard.

Classic Treatment

10th October – Board 1: Love All. Dealer North.

Disappointingly only one pair found (almost) the top spot on the hand shown below although as long as you trust your partner it shouldn’t have been too difficult.

	North: S 10 8 7 2 H Q 10 D K 10 6 2 C K J 9
West: S A K Q J H J 8 4 D A 7 4 3 C 10 5		East: S 9 H A K 9 7 5 3 2 D J C A 7 6 2
	South: S 6 5 4 3 H 6 D Q 9 8 5 C Q 8 4 3

West	North	East	South
	No	1H	No
1S	No	4H	No
4NT	No	5C	No
7NT	End

East is too good to open 4H and yet not good enough for a strong two (when you promise more defensive values) and the classic way of dealing with a hand like this is to open at the one-level and rebid game. West should be charmed. A check-up on the key players should convince him that partner holds the hand he does when he can count all thirteen tricks. There is a small point of interest in the play however. Declarer should lead the jack of hearts first and although he has no intention of running it a somnolent North holding Q 10 6 might cover whereupon declarer can pick up the remaining suit with a finesse against the ten. In any event the grand makes as long as hearts are 2-1, well within the odds for bidding it.

All The Way

2nd May – Board 16: East/West Vul. Dealer West.

Did you all bid the grand slam on board 16? I know Tony and Chris did and thought they had a good sequence.

	North: S 7 H K J 10 4 3 D K 9 C A K Q J 2
West: S J 6 4 3 H Q 8 6 D 10 5 2 C 9 5 3		East: S 10 8 5 H 7 5 2 D J 8 4 C 10 7 6 4
	South: S A K Q 9 2 H A 9 D A Q 7 6 3 C 8

West	North	East	South
No	1H	No	1S
No	3C	No	4NT
No	5S	No	5NT
No	6H	No	7NT
End

South did well not to force with 2S originally because you should never force with a two-suiter, but North is just about worth a game force of 3C. 4NT ostensibly agrees clubs and the response shows the top three honours. 5NT asks for any extra kings and 6H shows both red kings. All those known points just comes to 15 and North must hold two or three more for his 3C bid so South could bid 7NT with a fair degree of confidence. Grand slams are seldom easy to bid because there is so much at stake if they go wrong so full marks if you went all the way.

Every Reason

1st November – Board 16: East/West Vul. Dealer West.

Some slams are easy to bid and some are hard but as long as you can deal with those in the first category you will be a long-term winner. The hand shown below from Thursday should not have been too testing but in various ways things seemed to get out of control…

The only really technical point to be aware of is that North’s raise to 4♣ is game forcing and by inference looking for a slam. And why wouldn’t he be? Partner is showing at least an eight-loser hand by bidding 2♣ in the first place and with his powerful five-loser hand, rich in controls and with superb trump support, North has every reason to be optimistic. But then so has South! With a hand much better than it might be – an extra trump, a loser less – all that really remains is to check up on key-cards, and when all the main characters are present South can find out about the king of hearts with that 5NT bid. Just imagine that North held that card for a moment instead of the Q and J. Then 7♣ is a virtual spread if declarer has the foresight to ruff a spade loser and a diamond loser in dummy before drawing trumps. As it happens 7♣ is still a reasonable contract, with three ruffs in dummy needed now, but that ten of clubs in dummy is priceless. No convention I’ve ever heard of will let you find out about that.

The Science of Audacity?

6th September – Board 10: Game All. Dealer East.

Author: Steve Preston

When I was asked to write this blog I naively hoped to provide an erudite exposition on the bidding and play of one of this Thursday’s hands. Board 10 was quite interesting, I was told. Perhaps I could explain how it should be scientifically bid to whatever might be the optimum contract.

Establishing the best contract was relatively easy – 7C is excellent and indeed likely the best contract at teams. The second best, though more risky contract of 7N is also a reasonable shot. However constructing an auction that reaches either contract with any degree of conviction is much harder. Most tables started with an opening bid by East that showed a balanced hand of around 19-20 points and West, with 15 points and a powerful suit, therefore knew that bidding a small slam was de rigueur and bidding a grand slam a distinct possibility.

With David our methods would allow us to set clubs as trumps, ask for aces and the trump king and then further go on with 5N to ask for specific other (non trump) kings. Unfortunately we (David and I) play an ‘expert’ gadget whereby, with two kings, a response shows either the king held or the one not held. i.e. 6S over 5N either denies or shows the king of spades. The method seemed a good idea at the time! With the actual information gathered, personally I would have counted the 12 known tricks and although perceived wisdom is to only bid a grand slam if the odds are 70% + I would have bid 7C. So much for erudition and science.

Congratulations to anyone who did bid the grand slam – either by science or just audacity. I suppose it comes down to your basic bridge philosophy – two contrasting auctions : 2N-4N (for aces)-5D (one) - 7N (that’ll do) and 2N-6N (safe) Of course the latter sequence avoids the disaster of playing in Blackwood and the subsequent interesting partnership discussion! On the day the brave were rewarded – both 7C and 7N were virtually laydown. Leaving aside the extra chances available in clubs, everybody’s favourite line of cashing lots of winners in the long suit (called an automatic squeeze if you wish to impress your friends) would have left poor North unable to guard the three suits in which he held his honour cards.

Scant Justice

21st June – Board 20: Game All. Dealer West.

The main talking point of last Thursday was the 29 point hand held by a lucky East, although most pairs did scant justice to such a monster. All sorts of out-of-control sequences took place when in fact the correct contract could easily have been achieved with a little science or indeed with no science at all but just a little knowledge.

East should clearly open with the biggest bid in his system, be that 2♣ or 2♦, but whatever is chosen the response of 2♠ should be the same. That shows – mirabile dictu – a decent five card suit or more and at least about eight points, so that if I was told I only had one more bid to make on that East hand it would be 7NT because you can more or less count the tricks. For the scientifically minded however, and why not, there is nothing wrong in duping partner into believing that spades are going to be trumps. 4NT is RKC and 5♦ shows the king of spades. 5♥ asks about the queen and 6♠ owns up to that lady. So knowing responder has KQxxx in spades at least plus at least one other high card it should not prove too difficult to go all the way. Well done to those who did.

All The Way

10th May – Board 20: Game All.  Dealer West.

Modern bidding theory can at times be rather too convoluted but every now and then a hand arises where with a little bit of science you can place every card you need to know about in your partner’s hand. When that happens, of course, it is easy to place the final contract.

There is no need to go leaping initially on that East hand because a slam looks likely and when that happens you need as much bidding space as possible, so a simple 2♦ as a first response is in order. The 4♣ rebid by opener is the perfect tool for the job, a splinter bid showing a singleton or void in clubs with good diamond support and game forcing. Roman Key Card shows that all the main players are there and 5NT asks for extra kings outside the trump suit. Responses can be varied but a simple step response is easy to remember, so 6♦ shows one extra king – which has to be the king of hearts! Thus East knows his partner holds the ace of spades, the ace and king of hearts, the king of diamonds and acute shortage in clubs, enabling him to go all the way and bid the grand slam. What is more he can actually play the hand over in his head even before dummy is laid on the table: two spades, three hearts, five diamonds and the two top clubs plus a ruff in dummy!

View the play of the deal:

Or to view the play of this deal in a new window, click   >> All The Way <<

Under Control

22nd March – Board 11: Love All. Dealer South.

It would seem hard to imagine any route which would not take you to a grand slam on the hand shown below but as is the way of things it all seemed much harder at the table than away from it.

West	North	East	South
			1C
No	2D	No	3C
No	4NT	No	5C
No	7C	End

The initial 2D response is game forcing of course and when opener rebids his suit this shows at least a six-carder. Why? Well with another four-card suit he would bid it and with a balanced 3-3-2-5 hand he would either have opened 1NT or be rebidding it. After wheeling out the Old Black North knows – should know – that all the key cards are present, for South would have an eight count at most if he had none! So North can now count twelve tricks even if South had no other useful card, which is why I favour 7C over 7NT. Just suppose opener had

Now 7NT is a trick short but 7C can be made by ruffing out the diamonds and establishing another trick there. However playing match-pointed pairs I would go for the higher score.