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“Rock Crushers”.

During the course of a bridge competition, you pick up some fairly dull 2 or 3 counts, some with a bit more interest, even a few opening hands and just occasionally one that stands out from the rest. Like the one below:

A very nice hand. What now?

Did you notice partner’s bid…a positive response! It does happen, even to you! You want to make the most of it. With only two losers in your own hand, barring an extremely unkind diamond break, and this positive response, you are going to be in slam, the real question being how high.

Don’t complicate such an auction unnecessarily. What you really want to know is whether your partner has the K which will take care of one of your losers and if they have,  the Q which will account for the other. If they hold the K and not the queen, the possession of the K would be good enough. The danger in bidding a grand slam where partner does not have the K is that there may be no quick access to their hand. They may have the Q, or they may not!

However, there does not seem much to be gained from saying you have good diamonds. Partner may now respond 3NT which leaves open the question as to what 4NT from you would then mean. You want it to mean “Key Card” ask in spades. So, do it straightaway, keeping diamonds a secret.

Partner responds 5 or 5, whichever you play to show one key card. You know which card that is. You can then bid the next step up to ask about the Q, though since they have shown a positive response, grand slam must surely be worth bidding even if they did not have this card. Any of the Q, Q or K makes 7NT lay-down while there is always the chance of J10 or KJ (i.e. a finesse) or maybe a squeeze if partner produces useless honours like QJ or the J without the 10. Once partner has the K, you have an entry and that should be enough. Had, this time, you asked for the Q, the answer would have been positive.

Yes, even the Q as well, 17 top tricks! So, with that number, you would expect a reasonable number of Open/Intermediate tournament players to bid to grand?

The statistics say “no”. Out of 32 pairs who held the North-South cards, only 9 reached a grand, mainly 7NT while 20 played in small slam and three were in game. Part of the problem may have been that North did not give a positive response to the 2 opening. As many a politician has been known to ask, “if not, why not?”

A positive response to a 2 opening is “an ace and a king or the equivalent”. A 6-card suit headed by the king-queen along with an outside queen is surely within the description. However, grand slam could still have been reached after a negative response:

                        North             South

                                                2

                        2                  3

                        3                   ?

as the same question about the K needs to be asked. The difference there is that when North shows this card, South cannot presume they have other honours and therefore needs to ask about the Q, but the end result should still be at the 7-level this time.

ask the right question

So, do not over-complete what appear to be simple auctions…and do use Key Card, a very valuable way of finding out about the trump suit king and queen…and even about the suit which turns out not to be trumps, too!

Another wonderful hand: another wonderful tool

You hear this auction as North:

                                    North                        South

                                                                        2

                                    2                              3

                                   

No worries about this negative response but your hand has not got any worse by your partner’s second bid:

 6

 Q84

 J8762

 T875

How bad or how good is your hand now? Not that bad. So, if you have a splinter bid in your armoury, then why not use it on the way to 5? Bid 4 showing club support (you might support here with only three trumps. So, you have a bonus one!) and no more than one spade.

You may want to shrink away at the thought of putting down dummy as partner’s next bid would be all the way…7! Don’t worry.

That was not a bad hand for South to hold. It was made even better by your 4 bid, rather necessary in bidding grand slam. Clubs broke 2-2 and the Q was doubleton. Either of those happenings would have made this contract an easy make.

Two simple auctions involving “rock crushers”. Don’t complicate them. Save intricacies for more complex deals.

No rock-crusher for tomorrow but two questions involving this hand:

You are playing Teams.

 Would you bid at this stage? If so, what?

Assuming you pass, what action do you take when the bidding proceeds:

                        West              North            East                South

                                                                    1                   2

                        Pass            Pass                 x                      Pass

                        ?

Two to think on until tomorrow:

Richard Solomon

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