[han]

Here is a wonderful joined effort from my partner and me for which I expect a lot of flack.

---

I probably have to explain the auction:

1C = 3+, could be 4-4 in the minors.
1H = 4+ spades
1NT = natural but denies 4 spades. We frequently rebid 1NT with a singleton spade.
2D = artificial GF.
3C = natural.
3H = natural, but with 5-5 I would have bid 3H last round.

After 1NT I had several options.

I could have bid 3S forcing, showing a slam try with a strong 6+ spade suit. I decided against this because (a) my partner would likely bid 4C, after which I couldn't find out whether he had wasted diamond values, and (b) if my partner had a small singleton spade we could easily belong in clubs.

I could also bid 4D, splinter. Although a splinter with an ace is sometimes not a good idea, here it does convey the most important message. But again, we would have a hard time getting to 6C.

In the end I chose to bid 2D to see if I could learn more about my partner's hand.

Over 2D, partner's first priority if to bid 2H with 4. For the rest our style is to bid naturally with a strong preference for the cheapest calls. So 3C showed a good club suit, I could expect AKxxx. This was good news. On the other hand, he would open 1NT with many balanced 14-counts holding AKxxx, and would open many 11's. The hand also became difficult in terms of strain: if partner had a small singleton spade then 6C seemed likely better than 6S.

My 3H call was natural, and so was his 3NT. I figured that by bidding 4S now, I was showing a slam try with 6-4 in the majors. If partner had a bad hand for me then he would pass and we would likely be in the safest game. I thought that I had to have a slam try, I can't be looking for the best game by first introducing a 4-card heart suit (while I know that partner doesn't have hearts) and then pulling 3NT to 4S. Which other games could I be interested in?

Still, I feel like I didn't bid enough on this hand, and I also didn't tell partner that I had a good hand for clubs.

On the other hand, I blame partner for first bidding 3NT (inconceivable to me with no diamond card plus such great fitting honors) and then passing 4S with such prime cards. However, I could have known that it was not clear to partner that I was making a slam try, and our auction would likely have been better had I started with a clearer bid such as 3S or 4D.

Your thoughts?

[ArtK78]

I don't like the 3♥ call, but I really don't like the 4♠ call. If you bid 4♣ over 3NT you will no doubt get to slam in a black suit. Partner will infer a singleton diamond from your sequence. There is a reasonable chance you can get to 7♣ if you bid 4♣ over 3NT.

I don't see any downside to bidding 4♣ over 3NT.

[gnasher]

I agree that you were showing a slam try by bidding like this, and I agree that your partner should have become rather excited by this.

However, I'd have bid 3♠ not 3♥, partly for simplicity but mainly to ensure that 6♠ was played the right way around. It would be embarrassing if your sophisticated methods caused you to play 6♠ from the short hand with partner holding Kx xxx Jxx AKxxx.
After 3♠, if partner cue-bids you're quite well placed; if he bids 3NT (presumably to play) he shouldn't have have ♥A or ♠K as well as ♣AK.

In your auction after 3♥-3NT, I'd have bid 4♣. If you're expecting a singleton spade and diamond values, now 6♣ is looking more attractive - x Qxx KQxx AKxxx.

[han]

Looking at both hands, I can see many roads that lead to 7NT. One of them is responding 7NT in the first round of the auction.

I think that we should discuss the auction without looking at both hands and using that as an argument for bidding this or that. Perhaps I am alone in this, but I don't think that it is reasonable to picture hands for partner that have no diamond honors. If he has values in diamonds, getting to a grand slam is out of the question. If he has an 11- or 12-count with diamond values, then perhaps getting to the best game is still an issue. Bidding 4C over 3NT has the downside that you will never play 4S. Also, spades are your main asset, also for a club slam, and you haven't shown them.

I think that a better route is to bid 3S over 3C, and then 4C if partner bids 3NT. You haven't shown your diamond shortness, but at least you've shown your 6 spades and 3 clubs.

(note that I wrote this in response to Art's comment about 7C, before I read Andy's post.

[han]

 gnasher, on 2012-April-23, 10:30, said:

It would be embarrassing if your sophisticated methods caused you to play 6♠ from the short hand with partner holding Kx xxx Jxx AKxxx.

That's a good point, I didn't consider this at all.

Quote

In your auction after 3♥-3NT, I'd have bid 4♣. If you're expecting a singleton spade and diamond values, now 6♣ is looking more attractive - x Qxx KQxx AKxxx.

Do you think you can have a sensible investigation where you get to slam if partner has this but stop in a good game when partner has a worse hand? Will you cuebid after 4C and leave the final decision to partner?

[lalldonn]

I also like 3S then 4C if partner bids 3NT. This will lead to keycard in clubs then when you confirm them all it will be easy to bid a grand. If partner doesn't have interest in anything he can always go to 4S over 4C. I understand why you did what you did but it kind of complicated things and never showed a club fit.

Is it really true that partner's clubs must be AKxxx to bid 3C though? That is hard for me to wrap my mind around but if true then I think you just have a slam force. It will hardly ever be worse than a finesse I think, and much of the time it will be cold. If his king of spades is a small one then is he supposed to bid on after your auction, having already shown the AKxxx?

[gnasher]

 han, on 2012-April-23, 10:35, said:

Do you think you can have a sensible investigation where you get to slam if partner has this but stop in a good game when partner has a worse hand? Will you cuebid after 4C and leave the final decision to partner?

I wouldn't drive slam unless he admitted to owning ♥A. If it went
...
3♥-3NT
4♣-4♦(?)
4♥
I'd leave it up to him.

However, I don't think it would go like that - he shouldn't cue-bid ♦K opposite a known shortage, so this route won't work very often. I like this better:

Quote

bid 3S over 3C, and then 4C if partner bids 3NT.

[han]

 lalldonn, on 2012-April-23, 10:41, said:

I also like 3S then 4C if partner bids 3NT. This will lead to keycard in clubs then when you confirm them all it will be easy to bid a grand. If partner doesn't have interest in anything he can always go to 4S over 4C. I understand why you did what you did but it kind of complicated things and never showed a club fit.

I completely agree with this.

Quote

Is it really true that partner's clubs must be AKxxx to bid 3C though?

It is not something we have discussed. I know we wouldn't bid 3C on something like Jxxxx, but whether partner would do it with K109xx I don't know and I haven't asked yet.

[han]

By the way, if I bid 3S instead of 3H then I don't think that partner should bid 3NT. Given our auction he might have, but I don't think that it is right.

[gnasher]

One thing that might help is identifying the singleton spade earlier. After 2♦, with Catch22 I play that all balanced hands bid 2♥, and other bids show shape with a singleton spade. That helps on hands like this, because it saves partner any worries about whether his trump holding is good enough. It also reduces information leakage on hands where responder was just trying to check back for a heart fit, and doesn't have any interest in your club suit.

[han]

I think that it would have been a good idea for us. There are more ways of doing this, for example, 2H could still show 4 hearts (with 1 or 2 spades), 2S could show a doubleton spade without 4 hearts and 2NT could be a 1-3-4-5 shape. But I think that we would have been more comfortable showing a singleton immediately.

[benlessard]

It think 2D is a bit hard to evaluate without knowing all the responses and style but IMO when you have a chance to show a great suit, a slammish hand & show a splinter or not at the same time, I like to jump to the occasion. When you may or may not not have a good suit partner will often degrade a good hand without trumps support.

If you show a great suit everytime partner has 3 sure working cards he will get very excited even without trump support. IMO this is exactly what you want here. Note that you can always bid 5NT PAS later. Knowing about the 5th clubs is a bit a mirage here since its likely you need only 1 discard.

Passing 4S is a sign that partner played you for something like

AJTxxx
KQxx
AQ
x

[mike777]

"Over 2D, partner's first priority if to bid 2H with 4. For the rest our style is to bid naturally with a strong preference for the cheapest calls. So 3C showed a good club suit, I could expect AKxxx. This was good news. On the other hand, he would open 1NT with many balanced 14-counts holding AKxxx, and would open many 11's. The hand also became difficult in terms of strain: if partner had a small singleton spade then 6C seemed likely better than 6S"


btw could pard open 1nt in your style with this hand?

If so that would be my first choice.

[han]

Not with 14 and a singleton king probably, our notrump range is 15-17. The clubs are very good but the singleton king is not, I would not upgrade.

[mike777]

ok if I cant open 1nt then prefer 1c then 2c
If west bids an art, gf 2d will plan on a rebid of 2nt to show scattered hcp and limit of 11-14 i hope.

if 1nt(11-14) rebid is forced then prefer 3s now by west over 1nt will not worry if pard has a stiff spade.

[aguahombre]

After:

1C-1S
1N-2D!
3C-3S...East just needs to get over the little detail that he will be expected to hold 2-3-3-5, pretend he does have that (because the spade king is so good) and let spades be trump.

Now responder can find out about the K A AK and count 13 tricks. That doesn't require seeing both hands, just sticking with the original 1NT rebid and going along with the program.

[mike777]

I think 2d and then 3s shows a different hand then direct 3s over 1nt if that matters.

I would think a much worse hand but not sure how they play it.

[aguahombre]

 mike777, on 2012-April-23, 14:17, said:

I think 2d and then 3s shows a different hand then direct 3s over 1nt if that matters.

I would think a much worse hand but not sure how they play it.

I would guess the direct 3S could be used when responder wants to describe and let partner be the Captain, and the circuitous route could be used when responder wants to elicit pattern information along the way, and then be the Captain.

[Fluffy]

I think this is the first time I say so, but IMO Benoit is right.

Han, you lied to partner showing a 2 suiter, not focusing in spades, hiding club support and even failed to show your diamond shortness, all your arguments blaming partner for not going ahead with singleton trump are ill-biased IMO.

[han]

If you are saying that I bid badly, then I agree. If you saying that partners bidding is ok because I bid badly, then I don't understand that line of thinking.