[Erkson]

Doublers' life is sometimes hard !

These two hands were played today by strong and very respectable players.

8-board team match

Board 3
Dealer South
Vuln. EW

S KJT9875
H T85
D 97
C 7

S A2 S Q64
H AQ9 H K
D 4 D KJT865
C QJ96542 C KT8

S 3
H J76432
D AQ32
C A3

West North East South
- - - 1H
2C 4H 5C X
XX P P P

First lead : H5
Result : 5CExx= EW +1000

----------------
Board 8
Dealer West
Vuln. None

S AQ82
H 9763
D T8532
C

S 3 S K5
H K8 H AJT54
D QJ74 D K96
C AJ9753 C T64

S JT9764
H Q2
D A
C KQ82

West North East South
1D P 1H 1S
2C 4S X P
P P

First lead : HK
Result : 4SSx= NS +590
------------

Any comment about doubling and redoubling ?

Erkson

PS : with the proportional character font the perfect lining up of cards and biddings is impossible.

[Codo]

Hi Erkson,

nice hands.
First: If your opps never make doubled contracts, you just don`t double enough, but it always hurts..

Second: With this particular hands:
Hand 1: I am not sure, if pass was forcing for south when it was his turn. If so, I find his double absolute reasonable with two tricks in defence. Sure he suspected much more from his part for his 4 Heart bid, at least a successful opening lead (a Diamond, hard to find..). The redouble was ok. West has not much loosers and obviously he was right. I am a chicken in redoubling, so I had just passed....

In hand two, Easts double is clearly correct. Pd opened the bidding and he looks at quite flat 11 HCps which look very very defensive. No way to see the miracolous fit in the N/S hand with a void and a singlton ace in another suit.

Funnily enough, both times the weak openers had to pay. Maybe this way not just bad luck?
(Of course both hands are clear openers for me..)

Kind Regards

Roland

[Erkson]

Quote

First: If your opps never make doubled contracts, you just don`t double enough, but it always hurts..
...

Finely said.

Quote

at least a successful opening lead (a Diamond, hard to find..).

Deep Finesse says there is no winner opening lead for first hand (nor for second one, btw).

Best regards.
Erkson

[inquiry]

On the first hand, pass by south would not have been forcing the way I play (no pass is forcing following direct raises, since I raise on very weak hands...and use fit jumps, cue-bids, or new suit then raise to establish forcing pass). But the real problem with board one was the jump to 4Hs. This was very ambitious given three card support. I will guess this was someone playing fit jumps, so preempts direclty in spades was out of the question.

The second hand I don't like opening 1D with all those clubs, but the result would likely be the same on 1C-(P)-1H-(1S); P-(4S)-? as East will might surely double again.

[Codo]

Hi Erkson,

Well with open cards, there is no defence. But with open cards, they would play another contract anyway.

But at the table, if you win the first trick as cheap as possible and return a spade, declarer has two ways to success:
First: You led away from the Spade king..
Second: The spades are 7-1 and the guy with the ace of club has a singelton spade. Not very promising regarding the bidding...

If declarer votes for the second way, you better take your cards closer to your body and look for mirrors behind you and your partner.

Kind Regards

Roland

[Free]

Imo it's clear that if you play with light openings, you should think twice (or more) before doubling! And Double for -1 doesn't pay off, so only Double if you think it goes down 2 or more. I'd never double with any of these hands, and if they ReDouble me, I'd walk away and bid something else!

[Codo]

Hi Free,

I'd never double with any of these hands
In my opinion, you don`t double enough then. In the first hand, you look at two aces yourself. Do you really want your pd to decide, whether you should play 5 club, 5 Club X or 5 Heart?
To double can be a good bet for several down or a good save against pds who bid 5 Heart as a defence.
Did not work today? So what, that happen...
In the second hand, pd promised a fair opener, no one-suiter. Double was wrong, because their clubs had been 4-0 and the diamonds 5-1.
I don`t say, that double is clear cut in this hand, because your king of spade is of little value regarding the bidding. But this is not as dramatic wrong as you wrote it.
and if they ReDouble me, I'd walk away and bid something else!
Good to know Makes it easier to Xx you...

Kind Regards

Roland

[Free]

Quote

and if they ReDouble me, I'd walk away and bid something else!
Good to know Makes it easier to Xx you...

Kind Regards

Roland

Euhm, I don't ALWAYS run away... Only if I know that my Dbl is not that great, like in these hands.

[mishovnbg]

Hi Erkson!
1. 4HE in my opinion is just bad bid. SP suit is more important than HE fit and if you can show it to your p by any bid like 2SP NF or nj fit showing bid is preferable. If you cant ( and not willing to change your system yet ), then 3HE bid is more than enough ( I prefer even 2HE bid with 3 fit only). General mistake is to put pressure over opps, if you dont know what to do when they bid their game despite pressure ( or because of pressure ;D). In this case you dont know value of your SP suit... Second bad is wrong showing of lead HE. Dbl is ok, but now you dont know what to do: lie for 4+ fit and dont show your SP suit! RDBL is just bad style in VUL( unexpected ruffing for example can lead to 1000 for opps ), but relative safe in not vul ( last 2 times I watch expert RDBL in not vul was for 600 ;D).
2. All is ok, voids are rare happen and opps sometimes have rights to make their contracts even with dbl . Bad lead after holding all side suits and clear distributive raise to 4SP from passed opp. Trump lead in same case is clear!
Misho

[luis]

Quote

Board 3
Dealer South
Vuln. EW

S KJT9875
H T85
D 97
C 7

S A2 S Q64
H AQ9 H K
D 4 D KJT865
C QJ96542 C KT8

S 3
H J76432
D AQ32
C A3

West North East South
- - - 1H
2C 4H 5C X
XX P P P

First lead : H5
Result : 5CExx= EW +1000

4H is not good, I can understand north but he just has too few trumps to bid 4h. South double is not too attractive either, you have two aces and your pd didn't promise a single defensive trick. With something on defense let pd double 5c and if he bid 4h without a trick then let them play 5c. You can't win all the battles.

Quote

----------------
Board 8
Dealer West
Vuln. None

S AQ82
H 9763
D T8532
C

S 3 S K5
H K8 H AJT54
D QJ74 D K96
C AJ9753 C T64

S JT9764
H Q2
D A
C KQ82

West North East South
1D P 1H 1S
2C 4S X P
P P

First lead : HK
Result : 4SSx= NS +590

I'd open the west hand 1c and rebid 2c if needed, bidding diamonds first and clubs later is a distortion that I don't like with a 6-4 hand. East's double looks normal.

[Erkson]

From a serious today team match, another unbeatable redoubled contract :

Dealer West
Vuln. None

S 52
H KT82
D K4
C T8654

S Q87 S A4
H AQJ4 H 97653
D QJ9 D AT6
C K73 C A92

S KJT963
H
D 87532
C QJ

West North East South
1N Pass 2D 2S
4H Dbl Rdbl Pass
Pass Pass

Result : 4HWxx= EW +880

Erkson

[the hog]

What an insensitive 4H bid, as a response to a bid which could have been made on xxxxx and out. Nth also had no reason to x

[Erkson]

And the later one (always unbeatable, and from serious match still running at this moment)

Dealer South
Vuln. None

S 2
H T83
D Q975
C JT986

S KQJT5 S 98763
H 97 H A42
D 432 D T6
C 543 C A72

S A4
H KQJ65
D AKJ8
C KQ


West North East South
1H
2S Pass 4S Dbl
Pass 5H Pass Pass
Dbl Pass Pass Rdbl
Pass Pass Pass

Opening lead : TS

Result : 5HSxx= NS +1000

Erkson

[Codo]

Hi Erkson,

th first two hands did look like from a "serious match". The two later did not qualify for this:

To bid 4 Heart with
S Q87
H AQJ4
D QJ9
C K73

after opening 1 NT is plain silly (or 2 Diamond from partner shows at least 10+ HCP).
The double was silly too. Or did south promised 2 or 3 tricks with his overcall? I doubt that and looking into souths cards, I guess, south doubts that too.

With the latest hand, things wern´t better.
West made a kind of zero trick double and obviously his mho was not at the same wavelength...

Kind Regards

Roland

[inquiry]

Quote

Dealer South
Vuln. None

S 2
H T83
D Q975
C JT986

S KQJT5 S 98763
H 97 H A42
D 432 D T6
C 543 C A72

S A4
H KQJ65
D AKJ8
C KQ


West North East South
1H
2S Pass 4S Dbl
Pass 5H Pass Pass
Dbl Pass Pass Rdbl
Pass Pass Pass

Opening lead : TS

Result : 5HSxx= NS +1000

Erkson

West's double of 5H's simply has to be based upon a mistaken concept that pass over 5H was forcing. Holding 5 spades and nothing else, why else would this hand double. There are more forcing pass misunderstanding disasters than anything else when you endup examining these things.

Everyone should review their own forcing pass rules. In modern bridge, where people make jump raises to 3 or 4 of a major as PREEMPTS, and where the opponents bid on, simply saying "if we bid game, and they bid over it, they can not play undoubled, so pass is forcing" is not a winning strategy. I find it amazing that so many player (and very good ones) have made their "raises" weaker and weaker, but have not modified their FORCING PASS rules... if we bid game, then by gosh, if they bid over it our pass is always forcing.... is like beating your head against a rock.

If you play these weak raises... here is the first rule you need to ADOPT... direct raises of our suit, even to game, never establish a forcing pass. As a corrolary, you need to add a forcing raise, a cue bid, a fit nonjump, etc, to your auction if you want to establish a forcing pass if they bid on. The same Forcing pass disaster struck on your very first example in the orginal post. The other two doubles are understandable. In particular the one that went 1n-p-2d-2s; 4h-x... This auction is unreal, and north has four good trumps, the diamond king, and a bidding partner. I have to admit I would have doubled that one too. If the diamond ACE had been with WEST, if partner had had KQ of spades instead of KJ, if the queen of spades had been in dummy and ACE with west, or if partners three points in clubs was K instead of QJ, any of these would lead to down one despite the hand partner held.

[mikestar]

I believe it was Kit Woolsey who taught "we are in a forcing pass situation if our side has shown game invitational or better values". So in neither hand 1 nor hand 2 are forcing passes in effect.

South has no reason to think he can beat 5C opposite a defenseless partner, and if North shows up with a trick, setting them undoubled when you are down in 4H isn't the end of the world, and if we can make 4H they won't be down enough to compensate. If North was bidding to make, he will double (or bid 5H with a totally offensive hand).

In the second hand, East's double is reasonable. I really dislike West's opening. I assume he is playing Precision or similar (this auction would be insane in 2/1 or SAYC). If this is the case, why not open 2C on the 6-card suit? Then East might at least guess to pass for fear some of his defense is wasted. 5C as a sacrifice is actually best, but hard/impossible to see with all those honors. Esat might reasonably double anyway, but the 2C opening will guide him to the right decision more often than 1D.