All News

Daily Bridge in New Zealand

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:

Bridge in NZ.png nz map.jpg

South Deals
None Vul

   

J 3

Q J 10 5 4

4

A Q J 9 4

 

N

W

 

E

S

   

 

West

North

East

South

 

 

 

2 

2 

Pass

3 ♠

Pass

4 ♣

Pass

4 

Pass

4 

Pass

4 ♠

Pass

?

 

 

 

2Diamond-small 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. 2Heart-small seemed to be a good place to start. When partner bid 3Spade-small, bidding 4Club-small seemed to be a good idea (cue/ natural..you choose!) and when partner bid 4Diamond-small, 4Heart-small 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 4Spade-small 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 5Club-small, a bid that got a much quicker response from Paula and with it the use of the “Stop Card” because she bid 7Heart-small!

South Deals
None Vul

K 10 8 5 2

6

K 8 7

10 8 7 6

J 3

Q J 10 5 4

4

A Q J 9 4

 

N

W

 

E

S

 

A K 9 8 7 3

A Q J 5 3

3 2

 

A Q 9 7 6 4

2

10 9 6 2

K 5

 

West

North

East

South

Duncan

 

Paula

 

 

 

 

2 

2 

Pass

3 ♠

Pass

4 ♣

Pass

4 

Pass

4 

Pass

4 ♠

Pass

5 ♣

Pass

7 

All pass

 

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 Diamond-smallA and confirming she had total control of the spade suit. Sensibly, where 2Spade-small would have been natural and forcing, then 3Spade-small 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 5Club-small bid to show second round club control. She said, with that knowledge, 7Heart-small 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 Club-smallK 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 6Spade-small after an auction like the following:

West                    North             East                South

                                                                              2Spade-small
3Heart-small                         4Spade-small                   6Heart-small                   Pass
Pass                      ?

In their thoughts are whether their opponents can make 6Heart-small, whether by bidding 6Spade-small you give your opponents the chance to go even higher (this time successfully) or how cheap the supposed sacrifice in 6Spade-small 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 6Heart-small (980) while -500 would be a poor score if 6Heart-small failed.

In reality, against 6Spade-small, 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 7Heart-small, once doubled and all breathing a big sigh of relief when that club finesse worked.

Hardly a mundane deal. 

Richard Solomon

Go Back View All News Items

Our Sponsors
  • Tauranga City Council
  • TECT.jpg