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Lost and Forgotten!

A shame but there is one suit that does not get a look-in in many auctions….and that may be to the cost of one partnership in today’s deal. Would you feel like taking a bid with this sparkling collection in this auction?

 

 

 

1 promised at least 5 hearts and 3 was natural promising no more than 5 hcp.

It hardly looks attractive to offer a minor at the 4-level or even go to 4NT giving your partner a choice of minors. For all you know, North may not even go to game and even if they did, the spade suit must offer some opportunities for 4 to be defeated.

Even the vulnerability does not suggest sacrificing. You look set for a couple down at the 5-level opposite a standard take-out double…and that might be an optimistic prediction.

So, you pass and the continuation of the auction does not fill you with joy:

West              North             East                South
                       1                   x                      3
Pass               4                   4                   Pass
Pass               5                   Pass or x

It is not really your problem any more. Trust partner but somewhere an opportunity had been lost:

 

There was no way to defeat 5, with South producing just enough trumps and a very useful diamond card as well. Beware of a player who bids and bids one suit. He will often have a second one in reserve.

East has a very nice hand but how to progress it? One option was to jump directly to game to try to win the contract, not likely on this day. When North bid once more, several East players decided to penalise. Yet, were they really expecting to get this contract more than one down? Sometimes, the opposition do have their bid.

A few were warned about not doubling when South wielded the axe themselves first. That was the case when the top two finishers in the National Swiss Teams met each other.

West              North             East                South

Pam               Graeme         Jan                  Jeff
Livingston     Stout              Alabaster      Miller

Pass                1 (Precision)  4               x

Pass                5                      All Pass

Jan could hardly have thought it right to bid 5 when she had already been doubled in 4. Yet, 5 x down 2 or that “forgotten” club suit, 6 x also -300 was the best East-West could achieve, unless their opponents went on to 6.

The power of the Precision 1 opening and the penalty double of 4warned Jan that something was up and she and Pam conceded a quiet -450.  

Perhaps, well here certainly, the slower approach of a double or even a 1 overcall by East would or could have worked better than the jump to game and then a speculative double at the 5-level.

The pull of South’s penalty double of 4 by North or an unlikely 4NT by West should stop East doubling 5. As West, were you there with a bid for your partner?

Richard Solomon               

 

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