[kfay]

Scoring: IMP

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Lefty opens a polish club. RHO responds 1♦.

[P_Marlowe]

One option is to pass, since 1D is forcing, you will
get another chance, and they may tell you, what
they have, or to bid 4S.

Take your pick, most likely I would go with pass.

With kind regards
Marlowe

[gwnn]

4♠. They will less likely sac over our most likely game if we bid it right away. Double everything. Slam is possible I guess but CHO would have acted 90% of those hands.

[dake50]

Which path shows a moose? Pass then 4S or immediate 4S, I choose that path.

[OleBerg]

gwnn, on Oct 7 2008, 12:57 PM, said:

4♠. They will less likely sac over our most likely game if we bid it right away. Double everything. Slam is possible I guess but CHO would have acted 90% of those hands.

Indeed.

4♠ followed by a double (if they sac), should show a hand that expected 4♠ to make.

Partner should be well placed to judge what to do.

[helene_t]

I think 4♠ followed by double would normally be based on a lot less defense than this hand.

Still I bid 4♠. I expect to be allowed to play it.

[OleBerg]

helene_t, on Oct 7 2008, 03:48 PM, said:

I think 4♠ followed by double would normally be based on a lot less defense than this hand.

Still I bid 4♠. I expect to be allowed to play it.

We are Red vs White, so I'll only concede that we have a big maximum.

[655321]

Isn't OP asking us to decide between 4♠ and 3NT, rather than asking us which route to take to 4♠?

4♠ has 9 certain tricks and needs a trick from partner.
3NT also has 9 certain tricks, but there is danger of losing 4 club or heart tricks plus the Ace of spades.

I can't imagine passing this hand at the table, but on paper at least, there is some merit in passing to find out if LHO has a weak NT (bid 3NT next), or if he has real clubs (bid 4♠).

Perhaps Passing is OK, because if the auction doesn't go as planned, we can still bid 4♠ later, and I am happy to defend a doubled 5 level contract.

If I had to guess now, I would probably guess that the chances of 3NT making are greater than the chance of partner supplying our tenth trick in 4♠.

[Codo]

X

I have a hand which is simply too strong for slow bidding.
So I can take the call, I discussed with partner: X to show such a strong hand, intending to bid my spades later.
Or I can try a tactical bid like pass and see. But I think that the merrits are smaller then the gains.

I can try 4 Spade hoping partner does not look at xxx,Kx,xxxx,Kxxx or at xx,xxx,xxxx,xxxx. In both cases 4 Spade is plain wrong.

What are exactly the downsides of doubling first? Hmm, no downside.

[gwnn]

Codo you don't let them describe their hands so now they'll have to decide what to do. Neither player has bid his hand yet. Opener can still have three types of hands and responder can still have three types of hands (correct me if I'm wrong). Admittedly opener will just have a weak NT and responder the negative usually, but whenever this isn't true they will probably get it wrong.

[pclayton]

4♠.

Some people like to horse around on hands like this trying to gain extra information in order to place the contract later.

While 3N might be better, how on earth are we ever going to find out if partner has a partial club stopper? All 1♠, double or (gasp!) pass accomplishes is letting our LHO clarify his hand type to our weak RHO. I suppose if LHO has a weak NT, 3N is better, but if LHO has club length, which doesn't seem at all unlikely, they rate to have a profitable sac in 5♣.

Try to exploit the weaknesses in your opponent's system. Your teammates very well may have started 1♣ - pass - 1N which gives the NV side a chance at finding their save over 4♠.

[awm]

Double for me, planning to bid spades later.

This is different from a standard auction because the opponents play Polish Club. LHO is almost sure to hold a weak notrump. We have 21 high and if LHO has a long club suit he should have at least 15. Much more likely that LHO has 12-14 balanced (or whatever their range is). So I don't think it's all that likely they have a good sacrifice, and if they do it's because RHO is holding a long suit that he can bid over 4♠ anyway (opposite partner's virtually known weak notrump). So bidding 4♠ doesn't accomplish a whole lot on a preemptive front.

On the other hand, 1♣ was forcing so RHO could easily have zero points. This means partner could have some cards over there, much more than I would expect in a standard auction with both opponents bidding. We could easily be on for slam if partner has a few cards and a fit.

[pclayton]

awm, on Oct 7 2008, 08:57 AM, said:

Double for me, planning to bid spades later.

This is different from a standard auction because the opponents play Polish Club. LHO is almost sure to hold a weak notrump. We have 21 high and if LHO has a long club suit he should have at least 15. Much more likely that LHO has 12-14 balanced (or whatever their range is). So I don't think it's all that likely they have a good sacrifice, and if they do it's because RHO is holding a long suit that he can bid over 4♠ anyway (opposite partner's virtually known weak notrump). So bidding 4♠ doesn't accomplish a whole lot on a preemptive front.

On the other hand, 1♣ was forcing so RHO could easily have zero points. This means partner could have some cards over there, much more than I would expect in a standard auction with both opponents bidding. We could easily be on for slam if partner has a few cards and a fit.

This is an excellent point, but my conclusion is different. I forgot PC has a 2♣ opener for the 11-15 hand with clubs. Therefore with LHO very likely holding a weak NT, I think 3N is a real standout.

[ArtK78]

I agree. I think 3NT is the clear choice on these cards. It is extremely unlikely that the opps lead will establish 5 winners that they can cash.

[gnasher]

The risks of taking the slow route to 3NT are:
(1) RHO has a five-card round suit which can be set up, together with ♠A, and gets a chance to show his suit.
(2) RHO has a five-card round suit, and gets a chance to show his suit; they lead this suit, forcing me to hold up; then they switch to the other round suit, and set up enough tricks there to beat me. For that defence to work, LHO must have 6 round-suit cards and partner must have no second stop in either suit.

The risk of taking the fast route to 3NT is:
(3) LHO has a five-card suit and ♠A; partner has something that lets us make 4♠, and we would have reached 4♠ if we'd gone slowly.

I think that (1) and (2) are unlikely scenarios - RHO is likely to be keeping fairly quiet on whatever rubbish he was dealt. On the other hand, (3) is also quite unlikely, because it's going to be hard to get any useful information out of partner.

One thing we might find out by doubling is LHO's red-suit length. Presumably he'll pass with diamond length and bid 1♥ with four hearts. If he does either of those, I can bid 3NT with more confidence. I'd double.

[han]

I would double. If LHO passes I will bid 3NT next. If LHO bids 2C or otherwise shows an unbalanced hand then I bid 4S next.

[Codo]

gwnn, on Oct 7 2008, 11:49 PM, said:

Codo you don't let them describe their hands so now they'll have to decide what to do. Neither player has bid his hand yet. Opener can still have three types of hands and responder can still have three types of hands (correct me if I'm wrong). Admittedly opener will just have a weak NT and responder the negative usually, but whenever this isn't true they will probably get it wrong.

Csaba,

as Adam already wrote, opener has 90+ % a weak NT. Looking at my hand makes it close to impossible that he holds the 18+ HCP hand. It is possible that he has 15-17 with 5+ Clubs, but still, I doubt it.

Looking at my hand, responders most likely handtype is 0-6 any shape. He may have a better hand with one or both minors too. But in this case, he may find a 4 NT bid after "your" 4 Spade bid in the pass out seeat anyway.

I agree that Slam chances are remote. But they are there and - in my view- the chance to win with the slow route is much higher then the risk that they can find a good sac. over my 4 Spade.
And I have the additional bonus that we may play a better 3 NT contract if I double first and bid Spades later.

[gwnn]

I agree with all that, especially since I wrote about the same , however I strongly disagree with the idea of letting partner choose between 3NT and 4♠ because that would mean we could be playing a partscore! I shudder.

[pclayton]

The doublers appear to be catering to specifically a weak NT and a 5 card minor.

Over our double, how will we know if LHO has a 5 card minor?

OTOH, a very relevant risk is that RHO is able to bid clubs if we double.

[gnasher]

pclayton, on Oct 8 2008, 03:43 PM, said:

The doublers appear to be catering to specifically a weak NT and a 5 card minor.

Over our double, how will we know if LHO has a 5 card minor?

I've never played Polish Club, so I don't really know what I'm talking about, but I was assuming that opener's next action would give us some useful information. If he passes, does that show a weak notrumps with 4+ diamonds? And if he bids 1♥, is that consistent with holding a weak notrump with four hearts?

If so, then if he does either of those I'll bid 3NT; if he does something that is consistent with holding five clubs I'll bid 4♠.