EricK

Just out of interest, how strong do you play a 2/1 to be?

Strong if the jump can be made at the two level, intermediate if the jump has to be to the three level. There is not enough room after a jump to the three level to differentiate all strong hands, whereas a simple 2/1 gets much of the strength across anyway. So I don't believe strong jump shifts to the three level are a good idea. But since a 1/1 can be very weak, I believe it saves room in the long run (and makes bidding easier) if the strong hands can immediately show themselves with a jump to the two level. This is all of course by a non-passed hand. Jump shifts by a passed hand are fit showing (ideally a 5 card suit, 4 card support for opener and a maximum initial pass)

Are there any methods which employ transfers in response to 1NT 2♣? I was thinking something like: 1NT 2♣(at least inv) 2♦ 4+♥ 2♥ 4+♠,3-♥ 2♠ no 4 card major maximum 2NT no 4 card major minimum 3X 5 card suit maximum After 1NT 2♣ 2♦/2♥ (M = major implied by opener, OM = other major) 2♥ would show support but NF (but still inv values, of course) 2♠ would show ♠ NF 2NT is GF asking for more information 3♣/♦ natural (5+), probably 4 cards in OM 3M support GF (slam suggestion else just 4M) 3OM haven't got anything for this yet! After 1NT 2♠ 2NT asks for more information 3X 5+ natural 3NT to play After 1NT 2NT Pass = minimum 3X natural 5+ 3NT to play This is just my first shot so any suggestions/criticisms/improvements are welcome. (I realise that there are right-siding issues especially if one plays a strong NT)

In standard systems (but not 2/1), after 1♠ pretty much all non invitational hands bid 1NT (i.e. the cheapest bid) and the inv+ hands bid something else. How about extending that to all opening bids? So that after eg 1♣, 1♦ is bid on all hands with less than, say, a good 10 points or so and immediate higher bids show stronger hands. A 1NT response to these lower openings can be two-way - either balanced and invitational or 5+ length in the next suit (eg ♦ after a ♣ opening, ♠ after a ♥ opening). What are the benefits? One benefit is to immediately tell opener that it is likely to be our hand. After something like 1♣ (P) 1♥ (2♠) in standard bidding opener might have a problem if he has a minimum hand with some support as bidding risks getting too high, but passing puts partner under pressure to reopen in case we can make a partscore. If the 1♥ response promises values then the partnership is much better placed. It is true that in these methods 1♣ 1♦ is open to pre-emption as responder hasn't even mentioned his suit. But with responder by definition being weak on these sequences it is less likely to be an issue.

How else do you show the invitational hand over a 1♦ opening? Maybe 2♣. But after 1♦ 2♣ what does opener do with a balanced 14 point hand?

It seems quite wasteful of space. You could probably do better by combining your 3♣ and 3♥ bids into 3♣ and your 3♦ and 3♠ bids into 3♦. Later bidding can separate these if need be. That gives you two free bids at the two level. As an aside, if you are going to play 1M-2NT as inv+ I would remove the raises to precisely game (i.e. the 7 loser hands if that is how you evaluate) from 2NT and put them into 3NT for balanced hands and splinters for unbalanced hands. By keeping 2NT for invitational hands or hands with some slam ambition, you can further refine your responses (because if opener shows extras you can too at a low level and both partners know where they stand).

I think fearing having irrational fears is quite a rational fear considering how damaging irrational fears can be. So you are saying if there is rational reason for irrationality with regards to a rational rationale then irrationality becomes rational reasoning? That's one way of looking at it. It might become clearer if we consider phobophobiaphobia (the fear of having a fear of having fears). Since most phobias (or should that be phobiae) are irrational, it is rational to fear having them. But then to fear fearing having fears is again irrational. I hope that clarifies matters.

I think fearing having irrational fears is quite a rational fear considering how damaging irrational fears can be.

Aibohphobia - fear of palindromes.

I am a fan of bidding at the 2 level to show the force. This is especially true when I have support for the opener and the minor is strong and the major is weak. The reasons for these is that it allows opener to correctly value any shortage he may have. eg if your ♠ are Axxx and your ♣ are KJTx then a singleton ♠ is good for opener but a singleton ♣ is bad news. By bidding 2♣ rather than 1♠ opener is better placed to make a good decision. Reverse the black suits in this example, and I would think 1♠ is better.

Instead of Drury, why not play Fit Non Jumps by responder? This will provide a useful bit of information to opener if he happens to have a proper opening, and will offer an alternative part score if opener happens to have a 4 card major suit and a minimum hand.

There are certain hands where your thoughts should be along the lines of "I am bidding this hand to slam unless I find very good evidence that it won't be a good contract.". A five loser hand with good controls and primary support for opener's suit is one such hand. Given that, you need to come up with a sequence which supplies you with this information. There is also the question of small slam or grand which needs answering. Does a ♣ splinter really help anwer either of these questions? I think not. There are plenty of minimum opening hands with ♣ honours which make a grand slam a laydown never mind the small slam! Since ♦K is such a useful card for partner, it makes sense to start with 2♦. Then if you can start a cuebidding sequence, partner can tell you if he has the ♦K. Another approach is to use a J2NT response. Then if partner shows no shortage or a shortage other than♦, a cuebidding sequence should also identify the ♦K if he has it.

I would say you are setting off for another run if your body weight is moving in that direction, and you are not setting off for a run if your body weight is moving in the other direction. This covers the guy who's sliding his bat in and suffers an unintended bobble on the surface, and the guy who is out of his crease turning and putting the bat down but getting an unintended bounce.

Let me rephrase my rant and perhaps add another one for good measure. Every clue obviously helps you to make the hand when it can be made. But if the hand can't be made then all the clues in the world won't help, and if the hand always makes on correct play (where "correct" is determined just with regards to your hand and dummy's) then any extra clues are technically superfluous. So really these clues only help on a small number of hands - those hands where the correct play (as defined above) loses and there is an alternative winning play and that winning play can be deduced from the clues. I am merely questioning what proportion of hands that is. Is it really >50% (as Ben implies with "more often than not")? On to my second rant which is about books of actual hands (eg Bridge with the Blue Team etc). Here you will often see hands where they have bid to a bad contract and yet made it with their skillful play. That is all well and good, but it does leave some questions unanswered. Take one kind of such hand - it appears absolutely hopeless at first glance, but there is a particular distribution of opposing cards which allows it to make - thus making the hand in reality, say, a 5% chance, and obviously in the book it all works. Now well done to them for spotting that chance. But shouldn't an examination of all their hands show 19 similar hands where the 5% chance didn't come off? If so, how on earth did they win anything if they landed in so many bad contracts?

"Well placed honours" is a different phenomenon. In that case you know in the bidding that they are well placed. But if you had stumbled into the contract anyway with silent opps, you would probably still have made it because the honours are well placed. In the cases I am talking about, you play the hand in a different manner than otherwise because you know where things are from the outset. I suppose in the case where there is an opening bid and you have a choice of finesses to take or a choice of direction to take the finesse, the opening bid will give you all the information you need. But that isn't the type of situation which is covered in the sort of books I am talking about!

If you read a book about declarer play for intermediate or advanced players you are bound to come across hands where the opponents have bid and declarer uses this information to make the contract. Some books even go as far to claim things like "knowing the distribution from the outset should be worth a trick in the play" or "knowing where most of the outstanding points are should allow this low point count game to succeed", and use this to justify some slight, or even gross, overbidding. It just doesn't seem to work out like that in real life. More often than not (especially if I have made a slight overbid based on this sort of reasoning, but even if I haven't), what happens is that knowing the distribution of suits or HCP from the outset just means that I know I am going down early in the hand rather than finding it out towards the end. Now obviously knowing the distribution etc will allow you to make some more hands than otherwise, but it doesn't seem to be that many more in real life.

With regards to the run out of Bell. Do you think the law is right in this sort of case? Or what about the case of a guy running his bat in and it bobbles on the surface? It doesn't seem right to me that a guy is in his ground then out then in again and so on and the exact split second the bails come off determine whether he stays or goes. A better rule IMO is that once a batsman has grounded something behind the line he is in until he leaves the crease again because he is setting off for another run.

I think it is ridiculous that the only real experience the minnows get against good teams is in the World Cup. How can they ever become competitive that way? They need to play games against the top nations - maybe not the full international squads but against their second or third teams or U21 teams or whatever. As for the World Cup, as things stand there are too many minnows IMO. Maybe there should be four of them - the top 3 as determined by pre-tournament competitions and a fourth, mixed, team made up of the best of the rest.

If you play a canape club system, how do you handle hands with 5M and 4♣?

The first hand is a clear opening bid. After all, if partner has support for any one of your suits and little or no wastage in ♦ then they only need a smattering of points for you to have an easy game or even slam. The bidding on the second hand starts out OK. In standard systems, with 5-5 in touching suits it is always correct to start with the higher of the two suits (and when talking about bridge, "always" is a word I rarely use!). Partner was then correct to introduce the ♣. Bidding the suits in this order allows you to show preference without raising the level. I don't like the 4♦ bid as it is too commital. At this stage the possible denominations are ♥ and ♦ (and even NT is not yet off the radar (eg with Ax Jx Kxxxx AKxx 3NT is laydown if ♥ are not 5-0 and with partner's actual hand, 3NT probably in practice just requires a 3-3 ♥ break).

3NT is only OK as long as you have the (IMO sensible) agreement that after a positive response to 2♣ the bidding can't stop in 3NT. But 4♣ is better still. The 6♣ bid is silly IMO as 4♣ would be forcing and we don't know yet whether 7♣ is on so it makes sense to explore a little more. That being said, opener could still have taken a shot at 7♣. it is hard (for me, at any rate) to think of a hand which could bid 6♣ where there is not at least a play for 7.

1. I open 4♣. 4m is one of my favourite pre-empts. 2. If I opened 1♣ I would rebid 2♣ (then 3♣ and so on) 3. I'm not sure what you are counting as this hand type. Longish, strongish suits with less than opening strength pre-empt.

Given an unobstructed auction, how often do top pairs reach the correct contract? By "unobstructed" I do not mean that they would know beforehand that the auction is going to be unobstructed. I am just asking you to consider those auctions which turn out to be unobstructed. By "correct contract" I mean the contract they would choose if they could see both hands bearing in mind the state of the match etc. I doubt anybody has exact figures for this, but what are your gut feelings?

I'd just open 3NT to give LHO a blind lead. But you may not have had that available to you. Over the 2NT auction, I'd have left it in 3NT. Not sure what I'd lead from that suit. Low is proably best as it works if partner has the Q but also works if clubs break kindly and partner has an entry before opps have 9 tricks.

I'm not sure you can deduce anything from the fact that your hand is already ordered.