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It’s Fri day… for Junior, Intermediate and Novice players….and others!

Know the Question.

It is hard to give an answer if you are not sure of what the question means. That caused an inferior contract to be reached on the following deal. So, straightaway, over to you. Two questions:

·       What does the question, partner's last bid, mean?

·       What is your answer? 

 

 

 

The first point to understand is that we play the bid of the 4^th suit (3) as asking rather than showing. If South had a club suit, they could bid the appropriate number of no-trumps. Either North or South appears to have the other three suits covered and South would have a cover in clubs for no-trumps.

What, though, is the question? At the table, North thought it was simply asking for a club hold for no-trumps. They did not have one and so they simply bid 3.
South decided that the heart game was the best option and raised to 4, meaning that a rather awkward contract had been reached.

 

West had made a good lead-directing double and East obliged by leading 6. 4 can be made but it is tricky. Declarer wins A and plays AK but must not play a third round and must play on spades, not diamonds. (The defence can just score 2 hearts and 1 spade trick.)  In the event, North played a third round of trumps and East played a 4^th round before playing K. No joy for the declarer as a spade had to be lost and declarer had run out of trumps. :(

South’s 3 was a very good bid because they had a club hold, but 3NT is doomed on a club lead. 3 asked for more information about their partner’s hand, including but not only did they have a club hold? North had already shown 5 hearts and 4 diamonds by bidding 2. What South did not know was that North had 3 spades. North should have bid 3 showing a three card suit (they had denied 4 on the previous round of bidding.) South could then choose the contract, in this case 4. Thus, the bidding should have gone:

West              North             East                South
                        1                   Pass                1
Pass                  2                   Pass                3
x                      3                   Pass                4
All Pass
Note that if South had bid 3 on the second round, that would have shown a 6-card suit and, by agreement, may or may not have been forcing to game. So, South bid 3 to find out a little more about their partner’s hand before committing to a game contract.

Against 4, West might lead 7 or Q. Either way, South can win in hand and ruff their losing club in dummy. Now, play a spade to the T losing to the jack. Whatever West returns (probably a heart), South wins in dummy (K) and plays dummy’s remaining trump. The news is very good as K appears. The contract is made for the loss of 2 diamond tricks and 1 spade trick. 

Thus, remember that 4^th Suit Forcing is not simply asking for a hold in the unbid suit but asks more about opener’s hand….oh and remember it only applies when your side bids all 4 suits, not when one is bid by the opponents.

So, it helps to know the question being asked in deciding on your answer!

Richard Solomon
Next week, something like 190 Kiwi players will be crossing to Queensland for the great Gold Coast Bridge tournament. Next week’s hands will come from that event. 

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