[MinorKid]

(Side) Suit fitting is as important as counting sufficient strength for a slam so on the second round when you response 3♥
1♥ 2♣
3♣ 3♥ (I play forcing, even not in 2/1 GF)
That will excite the partner very much.

[the hog]

jh51, on Mar 31 2010, 04:47 AM, said:

I find it odd that everyone is quick to criticize my bidding, but fail to adequately address the original question.

My expectations were that the normal result would be 4♥ making +420 or +450. If I am right, I cannot pass 5♣. If it makes, it is still a bad match point result. But was my expectation correct?

In the open game, only a couple of pairs failed to bid 4♥, and one pair was doubled. +400 would not have been a particularly good score.

In the NLM game where I was playing, only one pair bid 4♥ and they somehow managed to go down 3! So +400 would have been a top.

What did I in fact do? I bid 6♣ based upon my belief that +400 was going to be a bad result. Dummy came down with

♠ x
♥ AJTxx
♦ xx
♣ KQxxx

Amazingly, the opening lead was a small ♥!!!!! RHO covered the J and I won with my K♥. On the second club trick, RHO discards a small ♥ from an original holding of Q9xx. Making 7 on a hand where 5♣ likely goes down against a less friendly lead!!!

For those of you critical of my 3♠ bid, consider that 6♣ depends only on being able to bring in the ♥ suit of the pointed suits are reversed. If I were to have bid 3♥ as some suggest, partner almost certainly bids 4♥ with that hand, and would do so even if the ♥J were the ♥Q, in which case the slam makes against any 3-2 split and at least half the 4-1 splits. How do you bid it if you don't bid 3♠?

Please note that after partner bids ♣ twice, I know that she is 5-5 in the round suits, and is not likely to have much more than what she actually had. Had I ♥Hx (and therefore an additional card somewhere else, I think it would have been the rare hand where I would have bid 4♥. Pass or 5♣ if the bidding had gone the way it did, depending on my hand. I think the only doubleton I would have bid 4♥ with is the KQ. Thus my previous statement that 4♥ should show 3 card support in this sequence.

I think you have misunderstood. Sure, 5C won't score all that well, but you will beat all those who end up in slam and get the marked D lead.
The reason some of us pass 5C is the last part of my comment. If you play against anyone reasonable, the D lead is marked. You have already misbid the hand by failing to bid 3H, so you will have to live with it.

[Codo]

jh51, on Mar 31 2010, 06:47 AM, said:

I find it odd that everyone is quick to criticize my bidding, but fail to adequately address the original question.

Why is this so hard to understand?

If you had bid the hand correctly you had not been in this mess.

So you basically asked: I totally misbid this hand, please help me to clean up the mess. Of course anybody can try to do so, but most of us think that it is much better to avoid such a misbid and take it from there.

[helene_t]

MinorKid, on Mar 31 2010, 03:23 AM, said:

1♥ 2♣
3♣ 3♥ (I play forcing, even not  in 2/1 GF)

Yes. 3♥ is forcing in every system.

If 3♣ is forcing then it is game forcing (or maybe forcing to 4♣ for some).

If 3♣ is not forcing then it has a narrow range so it is go/nogo. Responder passes with any hand that doesn't want to be in game.

Just like
1♦-1♠
3♦-3♠
is forcing.

[Cyberyeti]

gwnn, on Mar 30 2010, 04:54 PM, said:

if I was an alien who kidnapped the player who bid like this I wouldn't like my prospects but I think I'd bid 6♣, the only way to save this board.

If your opponents are going to defend like this, 440 in 5C is going to beat a lot of the 4H bidders who will score 420s so you won't be getting a bad score anyway.

If i was going to try to rescue it, I'd rely on partner having slightly better hearts and bid 5H, partner won't bid 6 without a diamond control, not a success here.

[hanp]

I agree with those that say you should bid 3♥. That is far more important than anything else about this hand.

[MinorKid]

jh51, on Mar 28 2010, 02:34 PM, said:

<!-- ONEHAND begin --><table border='1'> <tr> <td> <table> <tr> <td> Dealer: </td> <td> North </td> </tr> <tr> <td> Vul: </td> <td> None </td> </tr> <tr> <td> Scoring: </td> <td> MP </td> </tr> </table> </td> <td> <table> <tr> <th> <span class='spades'> ♠ </span> </th> <td> A97 </td> </tr> <tr> <th> <span class='hearts'> ♥ </span> </th> <td> K85 </td> </tr> <tr> <th> <span class='diamonds'> ♦ </span> </th> <td> Q9 </td> </tr> <tr> <th> <span class='clubs'> ♣ </span> </th> <td> AJT95 </td> </tr> </table> </td> <td>  </td> </tr> </table><!-- ONEHAND end -->

Playing 2/1 GF, bidding went (with no opposition bidding)
1♥-2♣
3♣-3♠
4♣-4♥
5♣-?

What do you do at this point? Does it affect your decision if this is a NLM event as opposed to an open event? (This was from a tournament where this board was played in both events.)

Bid 5♥ to ask for ♦ control, responder bid 6♣ / 7♣ if he has.