[Yogeshdg]

You can either open 1nt (playing strong nt) or after 1h please bid 2spades. 1spade is a gross underbid.

[skjaeran]

Yogeshdg, on Feb 19 2008, 02:02 AM, said:

You can either open 1nt (playing strong nt) or after 1h please bid 2spades. 1spade is a gross underbid.

Disagree. 2♠ would be a huge overbid. 1♠ caters for all hands not strong enough to GF. I play 1♠ as a forcing (allowed to pass without normal strength for 1/1), but it's absolutely OK to rebid 1♠ NF on this hand.

[han]

Agree with that, I play 1S as NF but it is absolutely clear.

[mikeh]

For those (misguided) posters who think that 3♣ was an acceptable call, consider that responder may well have a hand such as 1=4=3=5, or even more club-oriented, but without enough to do other than take a preference to 2♦. After all, for him to introduce clubs at any stage of this auction would show an opening hand (if 2♣/1♦ were gf, which it is for many here) or a near-opener for those who don't play 2/1.

Thus how would you 'FSF'ers handle a hand such as

---

Furthermore, I simply fail to see any real advantage to playing 'fourth suit forcing' by opener! Yes, if responder holds Qxx in clubs and we have Ax, we'd like notrump from his side, but are we really designing our bidding methods to cater to this very specific possibility? While abandoning all hope of reaching our best fits when opener is 3-suited and responder has modest values? Which is more likely?

I think those who advocate 3♣ have looked at the problem with a huge blind spot in their vision: give them the 4=0=4=5 (even with fewer values) that I described above, or some 4=1=5=3 with similar values, and ask them how to show that hand over 2♦ and there would be a stampede to '3♣, wtp?'.

Now, ask yourself to be responder and you see a 3♣ bid. How on earth can we bid intelligently when 3♣ can be 4=2=5=2 or 4=0=5=4?

My apologies to anyone I have offended by my tone, but I haven't finished my morning coffee yet

[awm]

On Mike's example hand, my auction would start:

1♦ - 1♥
1♠ - 2♦
2NT(1) - 3♣(2)
...

(1) Natural, game try, guarantees club stopper. This is "almost forcing" because partner will normally correct to diamonds on a poor hand.

(2) Natural, usually five-card suit.

Now opener can raise clubs and... I don't see all that many problems on this sequence.

My basic philosophy on all sorts of auctions is this:

(1) If we have bid three suits naturally, then bidding notrump shows a stopper in the fourth suit. It may conceal real length in the fourth suit.

(2) If we have bid three suits and notrump naturally then bidding the fourth suit is natural (pattern). After notrump has been bid, partner will normally pattern out (although pass is possible if the notrump bid was NF).

(3) If we have bid three suits naturally but have not bid notrump, then bidding the fourth suit is an artificial force, typically denying the desire to bid notrump. Usually this implies weakness in the fourth suit, or an anti-positional stopper, though occasionally I will also bid the fourth suit on a hand with substantial extras and no other way to force.