Bridge questions
For member bridge questions - and their answers...
Have a bridge question? Simply email it - with all the relevant information - to
How often do you pick up a one loser hand?
On Monday there was such a hand for East and nearly every pair ended up in 6D and no-one made it. Houdini might have done so! East has to play two rounds of clubs and then ruff with the 7 (giving you the 12th trick!). But then the question is how to return to your hand if the AH has already been played.
Alan Davies has provided this interesting board from the Gold Coast Congress - the Ivy Dahler swiss pairs - that he and Vivien played and which was the top board.
They were sitting NS. The bidding went:
E 1D, S 2C, W pass, N pass (At the post mortem N acknowledged that they should have bid spades),
E X, S pass (sensing a trap), W pass (a trap!), N XX (we're in trouble, take it out)
E pass, S pass (nowhere to go!), W pass. Lead 9D.
Last week on StepBridge, Annegrete and I had this interesting hand which highlighted several bidding issues when possibly searching for slam.
Annegrete opened 2D (multi), I followed with 2NT (strong enquiry), then 3D from Annegrete (8-10 pts with 6 Spades). This was followed by a lead directing double from the opponents which worried me as I had 3 quick diamond losers in my hand.
At this stage I bailed into 4S knowing there was a good chance we should be higher but that we had no agreement in place about which further bids would show agreement of suit and be showing controls rather than be natural.
Describing Balanced Opening Hands
12-14 Open 1 of a suit & rebid 1NT (1♣ p 1♥ p 1NT)
15-17 Open 1NT
18-19 Open 1 of a suit & jump to 2NT (1♣ p 1♥ p 2NT)
20-21 Open 2NT
22-24 Open 2♣ (Game Force) and rebid 2NT
25 + Open 2♣ (Game Force) and rebid 3NT
AG asked: I would love to hear from some of the experts at the club the answer to this question (both as Declarer and the Defenders): ‘What’s the first thing you do when the dummy is laid down?’ I know the short answer is ‘Make a Plan’ however, I’d like to know more than that. What are they looking for, what makes their hearts glow? What makes their hearts sink? What are their strategies for play?
AG asked: "How do you count losers and why would you want to?"
"Counting losers" comes up in at least two different contexts. The one I hope you have heard of is as part of a declarer planning how she will play the hand, particularly in suit contracts. For example playing in 4H you may look at your hand and dummy and see:
AG said: "With a Take-Out Double, I was playing with someone on Saturday who was using it to indicate that the player to their right had stolen their bid. This would indicate that they have lots of the bid suit, but I understood that the Take-Out Double indicated that you had nothing in the bid suit but an opening hand and cover in the other suits. Surely, both can’t be right ?"
Here we go:
TH asked: When a responder changes suit, it is forcing on opener to rebid. However what happens if opener’s rebid changes the suit again? Is this forcing on responder to bid again?
An opener's change to a new suit that is not a jump bid or higher ranking than their first bid (eg 1H - 1S - 2C) is not normally forcing when the responder has changed suit at the one level. It may indicate a two-suited minimum or medium range opening hand (13-18 points) and a responder with minimum (6-7) points may pass with a better fit in the second suit.
