[mohitz]

Hi,

I have observed that it is popular to promise 2 of top 3 honors when people cuebid in their own primary suit. What is your preference on control bidding in your second suit? For example,

1♠ - 2♥
3♣ - 3♠
4♣

4♣ is non serious slam try, showing a control in clubs. Is it preferred to use this to show the A/K or to show 2 of top 3 honors? Is one approach clearly better?

Sorry if this has already been discussed somewhere. I think gwnn is already searching the archives

Thanks in advance,
Mohit

[Phil]

The rules for Italian Cue bids are as follows:

1. Cue bid any A, K , singleton or void. Some partnerships do not cue shortness, some do not cue shortness at their first opportunity, and yet others do not cue shortness in partner's suits.

2. To cue in partner's suit, you need the A, K OR Q.

3. To cue your own suit, you need 2/3 top honors.

Fred had a nice article on www.bridgebase,com around 10 years ago that explained a lot of this, however, I believe there are some rules in this article that he does not follow himself anymore.

[kenrexford]

IMO, assessing merits of a specific cue definition outside of a complete context is potentially misleading. I like and use this meaning (two of the top three honors). But, that decision is conditioned on several assumptions, including the availablility of Last Train, Serious 3NT, and my understandings of when to use these. As an example of a "strange" application upon which I condition my meanings is that I might bid 3NT (serious) in some circumstances to show a "perfect minimum," meaning high control count and high cover count for a simple minimum. That's a tad unusual. Or, a "serious 3NT" to handle "touching controls" situations. Strange nuances like that.

My suggestion is to think through your set of agreements to decide what makes sense. Some variations that I have seen include a cuebid of a side suit with 2/3 top OR the Ace, 2/3 top INCLUDING the Ace, or even just a control. You could even plausibly have a variation like where a cuebid in this sequence of 4♣ promises the Ace or King of clubs and either two of the top three clubs or two of the top three trumps. Call it a "good stuff" cue. Thus, you would only cue 4♣ with the sole Ace or King if your trumps are KQ or better. You can probably imagine how this might be useful info for partner.