Hi Pam

Everyone is too afraid to answer your tricky questions! So, I will throw myself in the water and hope I am not pushed under by others who

do not like my answers!

Firstly, I am not sure whether you had any system agreement to your 4D bid. I play it as showing at most a 1 loser diamond suit with 4 card spade support... slam try. So, that would not do here.

I am a fan of the Multi 2D and insist on playing it 3 way including 8-9 playing tricks in a minor (single suited) and at least 16 high card points.

So I would open 2D and would like to believe my partner and I would have the following sequence:

2D             2H

3D             3S

4D             4NT  

5D              6D     5D shows 0 or 4 key cards

6D looks an extremely dodgy contract on a trump lead...indeed on any lead. You almost certainly have to lose a club trick and communication between the 2 hands is horrible. You will probably only make your contract if trumps behave and they lead away from a black suit king. Still, I would rather be in 6D than 4D.

Because of my high card point count requirement above, I would not open the second hand 2D.

This is a tricky hand after a 1D opener, as indeed is the first hand. I hope we would bid something like:

1D               1H

3D               3NT

4D               4NT  (key card)

6C               6D    6C= 2 key cards and a void.

I hope my partner agrees!

Thanks for the interesting hands.

Richard Solomon

Gazilli is a very useful convention for strong hand. It is a conventional use of 2!C that enables a differentiation of strong hands into 15-17 and 18+ and lets responder  show 8+ along the way. Its italian. 

Our sequence

1!D - 1!S

2!C - 2!D

3!D

2!C is gazilli either some 18+ hand with unbal 1 or 2 suited (normally with a singleton but here you have 7) or 6+ !D 11-14.  2!D is conventional and less than 10 with 10+ you bid naturally staying below 3!D. 3!D is now 18+ 6+D. After this partner is alerted to the strength of our hand and will be thinking slam in a black suit.  A further bid of 4!D now shows about what we have a suit good enough opposite a singleton.  Partner will return a cue and you will find slam.