[lamford]

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And what do you bid now? The last of my trio for my talk.

[P_Marlowe]

#1 The first q would be, why 2D instead of 3D?
I am fully on board with 1H, but 2D? The 1S response did not make the hand weaker.
Even if your target audience is N/B, ..., but than the counter argument q would be, is this really a N/B hand?

#2 Having survived the 2D rebid, I am now bidding 4H.
Partner does not have 6spades, ..., his diamond suit is at most 1 card longer than his heart suit,
i.e. chances, that we have a 6-2 fit are good, ..., he may look at 5521 shape but that cannot be helped.

[lamford]

P_Marlowe, on 2026-November-07, 06:22, said:

#1 The first q would be, why 2D instead of 3D?
I am fully on board with 1H, but 2D? The 1S response did not make the hand weaker.
Even if your target audience is N/B, ..., but than the counter argument q would be, is this really a N/B hand?

#2 Having survived the 2D rebid, I am now bidding 4H.
Partner does not have 6spades, ..., his diamond suit is at most 1 card longer than his heart suit,
i.e. chances, that we have a 6-2 fit are good, ..., he may look at 5521 shape but that cannot be helped.

I think the criteria for 2D should be "Do you mind partner passing with a 5-1-3-4 5-count?". Here, opposite Jxxxx x xxx Axxx 2D is high enough. Brian Callaghan told me that 3D should be game forcing.

[DavidKok]

4♣ seems fine, partner will know to upgrade diamonds, hearts and the ace of spades after we show short clubs. I think bidding 2♦ rather than 3♦ is defensible - the hand is worth a game force, but we have so much shape that the extra bidding space is very valuable. On the 1♥-1♠ start we might well belong in any of the three strains (not clubs), so taking the time to discover which one it should be is not crazy. I am very happy to be playing 1♥-2♠ as a weak jump shift, so that I can rule out the minimum hands with 6(+) spades opposite. Here that clarifies that partner has extra's or we don't belong in spades.

[P_Marlowe]

lamford, on 2026-November-07, 07:03, said:

I think the criteria for 2D should be "Do you mind partner passing with a 5-1-3-4 5-count?". Here, opposite Jxxxx x xxx Axxx 2D is high enough. Brian Callaghan told me that 3D should be game forcing.

3D is certainly Gf, and you are right, it is a judgment call.

I am fine with the suggested 4C,..., in an Acol context, in a 5 card major context I dont think, p will have 3 card support,
an without that, it gets tricky to construct hand, that give play for 6H at all, but I am bad at constructing hands.

[mikeh]

Interesting hand. I see the argument for 2D: if we get by this round we may be better positioned, or so we tell ourselves. In reality I think that we usually will not be much further ahead…the exception being if partner raised diamonds.

Personally, I think valuing this as less than game force is an error. I’m a notoriously conservative bidder yet here I can’t imagine not driving to game. Yes, we can easily construct hands where game is bad but imo we can also easily construct hands where 2D ends the auction. Do we really expect partner to bid over 2D with Axxx x Jxxx xxxx?

Anyway, having made my bed with my 2D bid, I have to do something violent here to let partner know I have slam interest opposite a weak preference. That, btw, will require an act of faith on the part of partner

[mikeh]

lamford, on 2026-November-07, 07:03, said:

I think the criteria for 2D should be "Do you mind partner passing with a 5-1-3-4 5-count?". Here, opposite Jxxxx x xxx Axxx 2D is high enough. Brian Callaghan told me that 3D should be game forcing.

Say hi to Brian for me. We played one Friday evening at The Young Chelsea when I was in London en route to Italy a few years back. The club manager lined me up with Brian after I’d emailed asking if he could me a good partner….and he definitely came through! Not merely a great player but a delightful partner and raconteur