Thursday, June 10th 2014

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Thursday July 10th, 2014

Board 13 North Deals Both Vul	♠ J 9 3 ♥ 8 ♦ K Q 9 8 ♣ Q 9 6 4 2
♠ A K 8 7 ♥ K ♦ A J 10 6 2 ♣ A J 5	N W E S	♠ 6 5 2 ♥ A J 10 6 5 4 3 ♦ 7 ♣ K 10
	♠ Q 10 4 ♥ Q 9 7 2 ♦ 5 4 3 ♣ 8 7 3

East opens 3H or, being vulnerable, 2H. Pass should not be considered with such a good suit -- AJ10xxxx is better than KQxxxxx. At a team game you might worry about -800; at pairs, the primary argument in favor of 2H is to suggest a better defensive hand than 3H. All in all this looks like a normal 3H bid at equal vulnerability: the modern guideline is to overbid by three tricks at equal vulnerability (and four or two at favorable or unfavorable.) If the worst happens perhaps they missed a slam.

West estimates six tricks for East's preempt, adds five for his Aces and Kings, and can hope to set up a diamond for twelve. A singleton constitutes normal support for an expected seven card suit, though partner won't have much flexibility in playing the suit. Visualizing, East might have xxx AQxxxxx x xx; win the lead, Ace of diamonds, ruff a diamond, trump to the King, ruff a diamond, AQ of trumps, spade to dummy, ruff a diamond, return to dummy and hopefully the fifth diamond will be good. With a doubleton diamond you could finesse twice in that suit. This seems to require two suits to behave, though, unless partner has AQJ of hearts or a fitting diamond honor, so slam looks borderline.

My partner opened 2H, allowing me to inquire for a feature with 2NT; while the King of clubs is useful I could not determine if trumps were solid enough. I could perhaps have cue-bid 3D; after the 2NT inquiry, a new suit should be a slam try, perhaps looking for a useful singleton or good trumps. Really, I needed AQJxxx or AQxxxxx along with that side King, so I settled for 4H. An opening club lead spared partner a guess.

Two pairs bid slam, one going down. Simply making 12 tricks earned 7.5 out of 12 matchpoints, or 62.5%.

Board 19 South Deals E-W Vul	♠ 9 7 4 ♥ Q 8 6 5 4 ♦ 6 5 3 ♣ 7 3
♠ Q 8 ♥ 2 ♦ K Q J 4 ♣ A J 10 9 8 4	N W E S	♠ A K J 10 3 ♥ J 10 9 ♦ A 10 9 2 ♣ K
	♠ 6 5 2 ♥ A K 7 3 ♦ 8 7 ♣ Q 6 5 2

West opens 1C; East has obvious slam interest and can get that message across quickly with a strong 2S jump. West rebids the clubs; Qx may or may not be adequate support (in my style, the jump could be AJxx) but there will be time to try that later, and either diamonds or clubs might be the right strain for slam. East in fact rebids 3D and West's hand turns to pure gold. 4NT fetches a two Ace or Key card reply and West raises to 6D, a near laydown contract. We actually reached 6S (partner rebid his sturdy suit) but no other pair reached slam so 6D would also have socred a top.

Most Easts will respond 1S. West rebids his clubs and East continues with 2D; some play this as artificial, an extension of the New Minor gadget. Whether natural or artificial, West does best to raise the suit, trusting East to have 11+, enough perhaps for game in notrump, spades, diamonds or clubs. East, in fact, figures there may be slam; does partner have a heart control? 4NT will confirm one Ace or two key cards plus the Queen, but West could have x Qx in the majors and there would be two fast heart losers. While I've seen many players treat a raise to 4D in this sort of sequence as a game invitation (akin to 1H-2H-3H), I personally think any voluntary advance to four of a minor should be forcing with slam interest. That would be enough to encourage West, who can easily bid the slam after East shows two Aces.

Five pairs stopped at 3NT by East, pretending to have a heart stopper; two apparently received a non-heart lead for +660. Five more reached the sound 4S game; certainly, you should try for a major suit game with such good trumps and only an eight-card fit in a minor. This looks another clear win for strong jump shifts, allowing opener to view his limited assets optimistically after partner bids spades and diamonds.

Board 24 West Deals None Vul	♠ 9 6 5 ♥ J 10 5 4 3 ♦ K 9 6 ♣ 9 8
♠ A K 10 4 ♥ A 9 6 ♦ A J 8 ♣ A 10 6	N W E S	♠ Q J 7 2 ♥ Q 7 ♦ Q 4 3 2 ♣ K Q 7
	♠ 8 3 ♥ K 8 2 ♦ 10 7 5 ♣ J 5 4 3 2

West opens 2NT; the hand is almost too good for that but I rarely upgrade or downgrade by more than one point, so call this a good 21. East has a poor twelve; it would be reasonable to call this one eleven and simply raise to 3NT. Visualising, it would be hard to beat West's actual hand, but where will twelve tricks come from? West cannot have three Aces and two Kings, so two of East's four Queens will not be paired with both the Ace and King. Playing 6S, the best shot looks like catching South with the Kx of diamonds; no such luck.

While many slams in a suit contract can be made with fewer than 33 hcp, that requires a "sharper" collection of Aces, Kings, lower honors in the long suits, and ruffing values. Qx in a suit should be a red flag -- even if partner has AKx or KJx, the discard won't be useful. The guideline of not counting both high cards and short suit points in the same suit works well here. Nine of twelve pairs overbid to slam. 2NT-4NT (quantitative)-6NT would be reasonable; if East starts with Stayman, what does he do after West shows spades? A useful treatment here is "4 Other Major Slam Try" or perhaps "Other Major Slam Try"; after 2NT-3C; 3S, what would 4H mean? With spades and hearts, responder should raise spades; with only four hearts, responder would rebid in notrump; and with five or more hearts, responder would start with a transfer. So Stayman followed by the other major should seem weird and can be used to confirm a fit with slam interest. (Note that over 1NT, the sequence 1NT-2C; 2H-2S has other uses, but 3S can be used to show the slam fit.) But really the East hand should have little interest in playing a 4-4 fit. 2NT-3NT would be a thoughtful and, in this case, winning auction.