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Being Pushed Around.

Your best hand of the night. The strongest hand you have held in terms of high card points for weeks…and what happens? The opponents bid up to game. The vulnerability, naturally, is in their favour. What are you going to do about it?

 

2 is a Weak 2 and 3 a nuisance raise (sorry, the polite word is “pre-emptive”, or just “to play”). Your 3NT is begrudging but automatic. What wonderful cold slam are you now going to miss? Then, the opener bids again! What are you going to do about it?

This board actually occurred in the Teams environment though I wondered if one would have a different approach at Pairs. I was not surprised by what the Panel said at Teams though I had thought they might think differently in the Pairs game.

Bruce Anderson “Double: at Pairs or Teams.  I have shown a very strong balanced hand and partner has not seen fit to bid over 4.

That indicates that they do not have a shapely hand and consider we cannot make a contract at the 5 level.

The double says I still have my strong balanced hand and 4 is going down.”

Up to the point you bid 3NT, you could have as little as a 16 or 17 count. You have hardly shown your strength up to this point.

 

Stephen Blackstock “Double: Pairs or Teams. My 3NT could have been many hand-types, including a running suit plus a spade stopper, so it would have been difficult for partner to take any action directly over 4. Double now confirms a strong balanced or semi-balanced hand and East will be in a better position to judge what to do. 4NT from East will be to play; with nothing worthwhile to say he will pass and hope we can beat 4.

Odd action from North, presumably with extra shape – but knowing that has little effect on what I should do now.”

They are united in action but disagree on whether our partner could act over 4.

Stephen’s last point seems relevant. The Weak 2 opener must have good shape, potentially far greater than the actual hand below and that shape could produce far more tricks than expected.

Still no action other than double, though.

Nigel Kearney “Double: The double may or may not work out best but with a balanced hand it is far too speculative to try anything else.”

Peter Newell "Double:I expect they are going down, and it's a long way to 10 tricks on this hand - in bidding 4NT it will often put them off leading a spade away from the king, whereas in bidding 3NT I may have been stretching. Not so when someone bids 4NT - would double at Pairs and Teams, and yep occasionally 4 will make when South has a club shortage - however, most woulld have bid 4 first time : same whether Pairs or Teams...

 

Finally, though, some acknowledgement that at least playing Pairs, selling out to 4x might not produce too many match-points.

Andy Braithwaite “Double/4NT: At Teams you double and take whatever you can and hoping for 500. At Pairs there must be a greater temptation to get a game score as you fear you cannot get 800 in penalties and therefore bid 4NT hoping partner has a couple of tricks for you in a flat hand or a playable suit of their own if they bid now.”

If you trust North to indeed have some abnormal shape, then I think +500 might be optimistic. The bigger question is how many tricks can we make in no-trumps. I decided to find out.

 

I was somewhat fortunate to receive a small heart lead rather than a low spade. The heart went to South’s 10 and West’s J. I had time to cross to dummy and run 10 losing to the “safe” North hand, losing to the J. A club came back and after losing to A, I needed South to hold K to make 10 tricks.

 

 

On an initial low spade lead, West needs to play the diamond suit for just one loser. Nevertheless, I chalked up 630 whereas West needs to lead two rounds of trumps to collect +500 from 4x (2 clubs, A and three heart tricks) or else the return will be paltry.

So, as long as you can make 4NT, that seems the winning action but it is by no means certain, needing either singleton J or a 2-2 diamond break. Meanwhile, if East had less in usful cards, then the return from 4 x might be diminishing further. 

Richard Solomon

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