All News

"Quantitative Bid" …. Can you say it and use it? I struggle to say it but it is a useful bid to use. The idea is that you ask partner to pass if they are minimum for their holding or bid on if they are maximum…a bit like the... read more here

Bridge and.... July saw a rather nasty cold circulating among local bridge players. While recovering, I was flicking through TV channels and came across a novel sport. One fan had combined his love of chess and boxing. The two activities... read more here

A Change of Plan. You make your plan when you first see dummy. Sometimes, something goes wrong and you have to make an abrupt change if you are to have any chance of making your contract. Take this week’s hand: North DealsNone... read more here

Staying in Part-Score. Part-score contracts are important too. You cannot make game on every hand. When we do not think we can make a game, we would like to stop as low as we can…but it is not always possible.    ... read more here

             Playing With “The Master”. Have you ever had a game of Bridge with a “DealMaster”? You know who I mean, don’t you? His (oops, sorry, that may... read more here

There was an excellent atmosphere on the last Sunday of morning of July as 34 students took part in a Schools’ Pairs event at the Auckland Bridge Club. We had players from Macleans College, Auckland Grammar, Bucklands Beach Intermediate,... read more here

 Playing a Tough Part-Score Contract.                 We left you as declarer in the  following deal in your part-score spade contract after West had led the jack... read more here

Ron and Sandra Cooper - Orewa. This month we have a joint nomination, a husband and wife partnership who have served their club in different ways for many years. For 12 years Ron has been a committee member and served for 7 of those years as... read more here

Being Competitive. One of the skills of bidding is, when the opponents open the bidding, of knowing to compete when an auction is about to end. This is called "balancing" or "being competitive".  If you do not, you will find you will get... read more here

Waikato Bays News and Rubber "Cat" ch up Teams events seemed to be back on the radar over the past few months.   Starting with Spa Town Teams in Te Aroha … this is the only stand-alone tournament Te Aroha host and it is comprised... read more here

Trump Signals Can Save The Day… ….. or even help beat a contract. What are they? Normally, we follow quite meaninglessly with our two or three small trumps. We can give the order we play them a meaning. We focus on the other two... read more here

SIX GOOD TRUMPS ARE NO GOOD……. This all happened in one 10 board match among 8 supposedly strong Open bridge players. Firstly, we must give you a bidding problem….or maybe it is no problem: With both sides vulnerable, you... read more here

Squashing Honours. We left you on Friday in a rather precarious contract after a very difficult bidding sequence. Let's hope we did not use up all our energies in the bidding! We needed to get 10 tricks with spades as trumps: South... read more here

Bidding What We Have Not: Not Bidding What We Have! The rules or guidelines around bidding can be strange or at times make us do seemingly strange things. For example, if we have 7 high card points and 4 spades and a 6-card club suit, we bid 1... read more here

TWO BIDS TO SUCCESS. Some bidding sequences can be very drawn out and can take many minutes to conduct. Others are very succinct….and I do not just mean ones like 1NT – 3NT. This particular sequence following involves a bid which... read more here

-850 or + 200? One of those will be the result of our action to double 5H in the following auction. Do you remember the problem? West DealsBoth Vul     ♠ J 6 5 ♥ J 8 7 4... read more here

Clear Signal: Less Stress. We learn at an early stage of our Bridge development that we can tell our partner whether we like their lead or indeed which suit we would like them to play when they get on lead. There are various methods of doing so.... read more here

VALUING VOIDS . As well as valuing 4 points for each ace, three for each king, two for a queen and one for a jack, we learn that we can add on extra points for our hand when we have a one or two card suit…or even no cards in a suit! Word... read more here

“CRIMES” SHOULD BE PUNISHED. Define “crime” in bridge terminology. A criminal action was certainly committed on the following board and should probably have made it easier for a partnership to have bid a slam in safety.... read more here

How Forcing? We often say that a bid is either forcing or is not. Yet, like so much in Bridge, it is not always that simple. We also need to know how forcing a bid is. Is it : Forcing to game? Forcing to 2NT? Forcing just for one round? If... read more here

WHICH ROUTE TO TAKE? We left you to play a rather awkward 3NT contract, only 24 high card points between our two hands and no good fit. Can we make 9 tricks? What’s our planning like? South DealsN-S Vul ♠ J 4... read more here

Opportunities Lost Or are they? Do we bid too much at the wrong times even at a lowish level? Are we too afraid to penalise at too low a level? How many of those questions apply to you? (Sorry, I promise not to ask any more questions!) I lie!... read more here

        TIME TO ACT ! NATIONAL CONGRESS UPDATE. July 2019. It’s three months to go before we draw those cards in Hamilton. So, it must be time to start doing a little planning if you have not already done so….... read more here

Keeping out of the Way. You find the right lead, the only lead to beat a contract….and then something major goes wrong! Take a look: South DealsBoth Vul ♠ Q J ♥ Q 4 2 ♦ A 10 9 8 6 5... read more here

A Good time NOT to win a trick. We spend about half our time during the play of a hand defending. So, it is well worth looking at some of the things a good defender could do. That’s in addition to learning about playing hands and the... read more here

They Open: We bid Game.     As South you pick up a nice looking 18-point hand. You are 4th to speak and there’s a bit of bidding before you get your first shot:       West DealsNone Vul... read more here

Good Bidding…. Not Good Luck. Luck plays its part in a hand of bridge. The best of contracts can succumb to a bad break while some with a much lesser chance of success come home thanks to some good fortune. However, when many pairs miss... read more here