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Paula Boughey and Duncan Badley

Four suits bid.

There are the mundane bridge deals, fought out between two sides in the part-score zone or maybe an uncontested part-score or game contract but then there are others where there is lots of distribution and where high card point count becomes lost amid singletons and voids. How high to bid and how good is our fit? Do we have a fit?

Like this:

 

2 is a Multi 2, Weak 2 in a major or strong and balanced, 20-22 style. That’s the opponents’ contribution to the auction. Our side has contributed at least one suit bid in all four suits. So, what to do now?

To state the obvious, South does not have a strong balanced hand. I state that really just to give you a few minutes’ breather before we come back to you in the West seat. We have bid hearts twice and partner has bid spades twice. We know what we have but what is our partner saying?

This deal tells the story of one of the successful pairs in the National Swiss Pairs last weekend, Paula Boughey and Duncan Badley. Indeed, we are looking at the hand and bidding of Duncan. He did not have a very strong hand but he had shape. 2 seemed to be a good place to start. When partner bid 3, bidding 4 seemed to be a good idea (cue/ natural..you choose!) and when partner bid 4, 4 seemed enough…but not for partner.

Now, Duncan is a stalwart of bridge in the Auckland area, both at the Akarana Club and more recently at Auckland too. He has not only played for a long time but he takes a long time…to bid or play or defend. From experience, he usually gets it right after taking perhaps more time to make a decision than many would. Paula said that after she bid 4 in the above auction, Duncan took more time than “normal”. Presumably that meant more time than he normally does…and that means he really took a very long time.

Yet, he came up with the right answer or quite a good answer. There were one or two right answers and one very wrong one…”pass”. Duncan bid 5, a bid that got a much quicker response from Paula and with it the use of the “Stop Card” because she bid 7!

 

 

On a different day, the East hand would be in the North seat and Duncan might be in trouble after his heart call. However, on this day, Paula was rapt with her partner’s overcall and showed that first of all with a splinter, then by cue-bidding her A and confirming she had total control of the spade suit. Sensibly, where 2 would have been natural and forcing, then 3 would be best played as a splinter. “Just checking” might be the words Duncan used while having his few seconds thought.

Paula expected Duncan’s 5 bid to show second round club control. She said, with that knowledge, 7 was the least she could bid.

This contract required declarer taking the club finesse at some point. Fortunately, for the nerves of this declarer, North enabled it to be taken at trick 1, fully expecting the top two clubs to be in Duncan’s hand. “Relief” could be the description of how Duncan felt when the K appeared. “Surprise” might have been Paula’s reaction.

Trumps could be drawn very quickly and Duncan did not take too many seconds thereafter to make a claim for all 13 tricks.

Diving or not?

The deal is interesting too from North’s perspective as to whether they should bid to 6 after an auction like the following:

West                    North             East                South

                                                                              2
3                         4                   6                   Pass
Pass                      ?

In their thoughts are whether their opponents can make 6, whether by bidding 6 you give your opponents the chance to go even higher (this time successfully) or how cheap the supposed sacrifice in 6 will be. Sacrificing would be more appealing were one’s opponents vulnerable. Going say 4 down doubled for -800 is only a small gain here against a making 6 (980) while -500 would be a poor score if 6 failed.

In reality, against 6, the defence can score two tricks in each minor, a heart trick and a diamond ruff, 5 down or -1100. Out of 28 tables, 5 North/South pairs took the sacrifice with the results being -1100 and -800 twice each and -500 once. Three East-West pairs bid to 7, once doubled and all breathing a big sigh of relief when that club finesse worked.

Hardly a mundane deal. 

Richard Solomon

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