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I will double. "X". My partner passed LHO's 1♣,so he hasnot a 5-card suit,and cannot takeout double, or has a good Club-suit. Bid 4♠ looks like a idea,but ♠ suit is poor.Who has the other ♠ card, my partner or LHO? Let partner choose Offense or Defense.

Do you do anything different when you are playing a team that is much better than you (in a 32 board match for example)?

Thank you, Kathryn. :P

East was obviously feeling guilty (or not very good), he has the easiest 6♣ bid in the world over 5♣, partner has shown a monster. I don't feel pass is a LA, but 4♣ certainly is. Were EW playing good/bad or continuous range for the 2 suited bid ? I think E should raise 4♣ to 5♣, but I think it's equally obvious to raise 5 to 6, so is pass of 4♣ in the frame given that he hasn't raised 5 ? I feel he's in some ways already conducted the poll of his exact peer :)

If rdbl showed 5+ spades and 11+ hcp then it is not horrible of course. 1x-DBL-1Y F1 and 4+ There are hands you may decide to start RDBL, but you do that when you are expecting them to have no good fit and/or planning to punish them. Kathryn was polite when she said RDBL was horrible, you don't wanna hear my opinion about the RDBL in this auction. RDBL is horrible because -You are letting your LHO bid his ♥ suit at 1 level -You are taking the risk of being preempted before you get to introduce your suit. -Because of delaying to bid your suit, you will waste space in your next turn(s) -Because of introducing your suit later, you will also have to introduce your fit in diamond later ( or you will have to hide it) -RDBL may immediately show your strength but i don't know why people think this is important especially when their hand has lot more stories to tell to pd and starting with your natural bid DOES NOT deny the strength you hold anyway. -It is horrible because this hand is neither strong enough to make GF and introduce his suit+ his support later, nor has any penalty plans before 4 level by opponents. -RDBL disables your side from using DBL conveniently if auction gets competitive, due to the nature of RDBL. Everyone has their own ways, mine is simple, jump shift by responder is fit showing and inv+ in competition and/or by passed hand. 1♦-X-2♠ shows my 5 card spade + 4 card diamond + my values. It aint perfect i know. Some people play xfers responses. But playing 1 level suits as limited and NF and redoubling with all 10+ hcps or whatever their limit is, worse than horrible imo.

Dbl = 4+ spades (may be passed) 3S denies 4 spades, looking for 3NT 4C = diamonds 4D = clubs 4H = 6+ spades 4S = both minors

:P 4♠ seems right. Partner is marked with either one or two cards in ♥. Worst case he is 3-2-4-4. We may go down in 4♠, but maybe they will take the push? Imo, double is horrible. It more or less denies 4♠ and says "the opponents are idiots". RHO knows how many ♥ his side has, so are you willing to play him/her for a fool? My duplicate games are usually tougher than that.

[hv=pc=n&s=sakqj74hda62ck862&w=s862hajt96d98753c&n=sth74dkj4caqjt743&e=s953hkq8532dqtc95&d=n&v=0&b=1&a=p2hd4h5cppp]399|300[/hv] Coulda, Shoulda, Woulda... Oh well. Who is to blame? One? Both? How much?

No you are not! You are 5-6, but chose, for reasons that escape me, to bid as if you were 6-5. Given the hcp weakness and our shape, it would have been very unusual for 3♣ by us to have ended the auction, and we could therefore have expected to show our 5=6 via a later spade bid. That sequence would have allowed partner to contribute to our dialogue. Having decided to mastermind, we now have to decide what to do. We created this problem for no apparent reason. Bidding 5♠ feels like I am the lead lemming heading for the cliff, but I still do it.....while promising myself that next time I will bid intelligently.

I am used to play the other round, partner will be on lead and 5 clubs invites him to lead a club, to compeate till 6 dias if they outbid us, or even further but not to pass... sry guys, i am dealt 9 suits in 4th position too seldom so I have the agreement that such bids are with fit

5♣. Since I am leading against ♠contracts it cannot be purely lead directing

If North weren't a passed hand, I'd put it all on South. He can expect some trump quality, and the spades should be able to provide the diamond discards from dummy.

It's clear for North to open, but even so, it's clear for South to bid on. ♣AQxxx and out is a cold grand. Even ♣QJxxxx must be a fair shot for six. Simply, South judged poorly. North's initial pass may have been poor judgement or an exotic system, but it shouldn't have led to the result. South 100%.

I'll pin the blame on North for not opening. There's no way South is going to play partner for that hand.

I also don't get the possibly 5 S thing, I saw two very good players end up in a shouting match over that style (which seems to be a SoCal thing?) after losing a good regional Bracket 2 KO b/c of it. Nevertheless: 3D = the neg X didn't show C, and did show S with D, but not 5S b/c 2S was available, and somewhat ambiguous as to HCP; 3N = yes, only 4 S, but decent H and decent HCP, bal. So why doesn't pard pass 3N? or in view of the ambiguity of 3D, pass 3H, since s/he doesn't expect 5S and short H?

With two likely stoppers I think 4nt is worth consideration.

5♦, I have the worst possible ♥holding and p could only bid a nf 2♣ over the X.

My understanding was that in the one partnership where awm plays gazilli, he plays 1NT as a standard american response, and basically plays the ambra version of gazilli. (same as in the 1H-1NT auctions.) They do something weird over auctions that start 1S, but I'm not sure I know exactly what that is (as in, "where it's from", not as in "I don't know what is played"). ETA the parenthetical.

did you see the other thread? http://www.bridgebase.com/forums/topic/54859-gazzilli/

All the advice about don't be intimidated, focus, etc is good. I highly recommend against all the advice about looking for chances to swing, doing something weird, and stuff like that. I mean seriously, any time there has been an upset in a match, how often has it happened because the worse team played well and maybe got lucky somewhere along the way, and how often has it happened because they were swinging and randomizing and taking carefully-chosen-anti-percentage actions? I can't think of any instances at all of the second one, which I'm sure someone will come forward with some story of it happening but overall that would be way less common than just winning because you played your best and it was your day.

The attached link contains some advice on this from a number of people likely to be playing on the "better teams" - compiled by Steve Robinson http://www.districtsix.org/Articles/2005-08.html

welcome to the club ! I find indeed Gazilli after 1♥-1♠ quite challenging as the responder is not limited . I play Gazilli in 2 different partnerships - one partner chose to stick to a basic approach (2♦ over 2♣ 8+ then 2OM GF, 2NT inv, 3x 5-5 or strong one suiter) the rationnale is that the frequency is low and somehow we never had problem with this approach - in my other partnership i started from awm approach. So now , 1NT is the relay , 2♣ natural, 2♦ 3spades medium hand , 2♥ natural , 2♠ mini 4trumps (a tribute to my sef upbringing :)) , 2NT 6H4D medium hand, 3♣ 6H3S medium hand, 3D 5-5 medium not forcing over 1NT : 2♣ shows desire to play 2D or strong hand (opener bids 2♦ unless he has strong version), 2D shows 8-10 other bids are weak would be happy sto share further details . PM me if interested

Thanks very much for all the comments. Much appreciated.

I think one's odds of winning improve if you do things differently than the (better) opposition. The key is to do things differently, but just as well .. or as close to that goal as possible. My opinion is that the best way to do this is in the bidding and the best way to that is by increasing the differences in system. For example... 1) It is likely that your opponents are going to be playing a strongish 1NT opening (15-17 or 14-16), so use a weak NT. 2) If your opponents at the other table are playing Precision, play standard (or vice versa). If you are systemically versatile, play Blue Team or Acol or Polish or any other approach that is reasonable but different. 3) Use a similar strategy in your defensive and preemptive bidding. 4) Underbidding (in close situations) is likely to be more effective than overbidding in constructive auctions.

No-one seems to have mentioned the main thing that I do differently - I lose more often! :)

I've just finished the book Why They Win by Stephen Cashmere and Justin Corfield reckon that 70% of it is because of the stronger teams better bidding judgement. They have some recommendations at the end which are worth considering, one being to prune your convention card. Its quite an entertaining book, especially the last match which involves Zia.