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The Effect of Nuisance Bidding by Anthony Ker

Hot off the press. Our first bidding article fresh from the National Teams held in New Plymouth (19^th/20^th November)

Round 6 saw the decisive clash between the two leading teams in the New Plymouth National Teams event. Board 9 saw the West players holding a healthy 24 count but facing a tricky bidding challenge. First, try bidding these two hands with your favourite partner:

West               East

KQJ2              1094

AK3                  J65

AQ106              K752

AJ                   K98

 

North is the dealer. E/W are Vul and there are three passes to West. A typical Acol auction might be;

West                    East

                             Pass

2                        2

2NT (23-24)        3NT

Pass

 

 Failure. The trick is, of course, to reach the making 6 and avoid the doomed 6NT. North has the Q and will make it as long as they do not lead 4th best vs 6NT - tip - do not lead 4th best vs 6NT! It's amazing how many people do this without hesitation. It's completely different from leading against 3NT.

Anyway, Charles and I had the technology to get there, using the Fantunes bidding system. Here's how it works:

West                                                 East

1 (14+, clubs or balanced)             1 (0-11 no major)

2 (18+ with  or 23+ balanced)    2 (4+ points)

2NT (23+ balanced)                          3  (natural)

4 ( support start cue-bidding)   5 (1 keycard, control in clubs, no  

                                                                control in either major)

6 (expects to lose A and make the rest, discarding any heart losers on spade winners).

All very fine in theory. I'm sure Martin Reid and Peter Newell have their own route to 6 using their highly developed relays after a strong club opening.

What actually happened

 However, these days you seldom have the luxury of an uncontested auction. Despite having only 9 points between them, both N/S pairs were in there making life difficult for their opponents. Here's how the auction went at the table where Martin and Peter played against John Patterson and Murat Genc.

(1 was 16+ Precision style.)

West must have been tempted but the diamond fit had not been located. With South on lead, the club attack was through the AJ not around to it and 11 tricks resulted.

Meanwhile, Michael Ware had heard two passes and was admiring his stunning collection in the above South hand. This is an automatic pass for 99% of the bridge world but Michael is not the leading NZ master point holder for nothing. He opened a 2 Multi! 10 losers, 3 points, only 5 hearts. It is truly awful but Michael's timing was perfect. Watch how we struggled to find the best spot after this diabolical start to the auction;

 (redouble was for rescue)

The Moysian 4-3 was solid but not as good as 6. The extra trump is essential. East's 3 was good in that it set up a game force and alerted West to the slam potential. The raise to 4 was perhaps not so good in that the diamonds got lost. West might have recovered the situation by jumping to 6 over 5 to offer a choice of slams but he was expecting a 4-4 fit in spades.

In case you are wondering 2x would have cost 800. No good at Pairs but no great disaster at Teams when 660 is available and a possible 1370 on offer.

GeO Tislevoll was on lead to 6 and he had his thinking cap on. Both opponents seemed to be reasonably balanced. His partner had long hearts and at least 2 spades. Was there not a good chance he was short in clubs? Accordingly, he led a low club away from the queen, got in with the A and led another club. Close but no cigar. When Michael followed to the second club, Charles was able to draw the rest of the trumps, take a heart discard on the K and claim when diamonds behaved.

That was a slightly fortuitous 13 imps to the Ker team, who won the match 25-22 and the event in a very close finish by 0.32 VPs.

So, without the interference, would both East-West pairs have found the diamond slam? I think so.

(The picture is of Anthony and Charles Ker.)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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