dburn

Would open 1♥. Why shouldn't I overcall it?

That would not solve the problem mentioned above. You make a bid, or play so my clock starts running. But I need you to explain your methods to me, and this should not happen on my time (or at least, not entirely). There is nothing much wrong with using clocks as they do in chess, except that it would be rather awkward to press a clock after playing each card. The only solution I can envisage is monitoring by people who know what they're doing. That's not going to be possible except at major tournaments, of course, but it ought to happen there.

What appears to be so is not always so, especially at rubber bridge against Zia. Would he really make an SOS redouble with 1=3=5=4 or 1=3=4=5 shape? Perhaps, but it is rather more likely that he would first run to 1NT and then redouble that, in order to suggest that his partner rescue to a minor rather than to a three-card heart suit. If Zia really is 1=3 in the majors, have both opponents false-carded in hearts? Yes, they have. But they are not on your side - that's why they're called opponents.

Now I come to think about it - what would you Standard Americans do with the North hand after 1♦-(1♠)? Would you do it in tempo?

[hv=d=s&v=n&n=sa832h65dkj9cak98&s=sk105hkq73da43cj73]133|200|Scoring: Chicago[/hv] Zia to your right, Robert Sheehan to your left, fifty cents a point. You open 1♦ - your partner plays five-card majors. LHO bids 1♠ and partner doubles for penalty. Yes, yes, I know - but it might even have worked. Redouble, says Zia, you pass, 2♥ says Sheehan and partner (bless him) bids 3♥. You bid 3NT, all pass, and Sheehan leads the six of clubs. You duck that to Zia's queen, and he plays the jack of hearts to the king and ace. Sheehan returns the two of hearts to Zia's nine; you duck, and Zia shifts to the six of spades. How would you play if: [a] at this moment you hated your RHO worse than your LHO? you hated both of them equally? [c] you hated your partner worse than either of your opponents (I mean, how would they have done in 2♥ doubled, after all)?

You mean you made all those other bids on purpose? :) Soon after I started playing the method I have described above, the following murderous problem confronted me: ♠Q432 ♥2 ♦Q10873 ♣432 One weak no trump to the left, double, two natural hearts to the right. I could hear the sniggers of the takeout doublers as I considered whether I should double ("I would sit for your double of 2♥") or pass ("I will not pass your penalty double of 2♥, but my next bid will be forcing.") Eventually I decided that playing purely natural methods, I would have passed and sat for 2♥ doubled, so I doubled and sat perforce when partner passed. But I wasn't any worse off than the takeout doubler in the other room - he doubled happily, thus transferring the problem to his partner, who had a 3=3=3=4 seventeen count. We beat two hearts doubled a trick (phew); at the other table our team-mates beat three clubs a trick (three diamonds was cold, but how could they get to that when aggressor could have had a club one-suiter?) We modified things so that we weren't actually in a game force if advancer passed and then pulled - but since then, no murderous problems seemed to confront us. Maybe we were lucky.

If you play that after you have doubled 1NT for penalty the opponents are not allowed to play two of a minor (or two of anything) undoubled, the following scheme works pretty well - or at least it did when I played it with Brian Callaghan, whose idea (as far as I know) it was. After (1NT) Dble (2X) Two of a suit = "I have nothing but the long bad suit I have just bid." 2NT = "I have a long bad suit that I cannot bid at the two level, or a very distributional game force." Three of a suit = "I have nothing but a long good suit (maybe KJxxxx or better)." Double = "I would pass your penalty double of 2X." (Note: advancer does this with a bad balanced hand as well as with scattered values, and concedes 280 or 670 or whatever, but sometimes when aggressor* doubles 1NT and advancer* has nothing, all you can do is pick a grave in which to die). Pass = "Either I would double 2X for penalty, or I would not pass your penalty double of 2X. In the latter case I will bid, and we will be in a game force (else I would have bid earlier)." After advancer's and opener's passes, aggressor doubles if he would have passed advancer's penalty double and bids if he would not (2NT is defined as a strong two-suiter, or a very strong three-suiter short in Xs that does not want to double). This isn't perfect (nothing is), but it does at least avoid collecting 350 instead of 680 or 1430 against Rosenberg, and makes the bidding of other awkward hand types somewhat easier. *Aggressor: the first member of the non-opening side not to pass. Advancer: aggressor's partner.

Oh, well. It turned out that partner had long bad spades, a few diamonds, and a death wish. That's the trouble with reading just the first post, writing an answer, and then finding that the original poster has already spilled the beans. If you're wrong you look a complete idiot; if you're right no one will believe that you didn't read all the other posts before posting your own. Still, at least I would have pulled on pclayton's actual hand facing pclayton's actual partner. And at least someone for whose opinion I have much respect thinks that fit non-jumps are as stupid as I think they are, which is very stupid indeed.

Long bad spades, a few diamonds, and a death wish.

Would have opened 1♣ every day of the week and twice on Sundays - ace-ace-king is an opening bid in all positions at all vulnerabilities. So that can't be the worst bid. Might have responded 1♦ just in case partner had a balanced 2NT rebid with some major that could profitably be led through (AQ doubleton, or Kx). But 1NT makes it harder for them to bid the majors, or to judge how high to contest if they do bid the majors, so that can't be the worst bid either. Detest 2♣ - that just tells the opponents to bid, when we might easily buy it in 1NT and run seven tricks with them cold for eight or nine in a major. So that could easily be the worst bid, had it not been superseded by... 3NT, which is an out-and-out gamble in a position where there is no need to gamble. If I'm not supposed to be 3=3=5=2, then I could bid a simple 2♦ or try two of a major, to show values in that suit and maybe attract a diamond lead against 3NT if that's where we end up. But I would bid an honest 3♣ - that way, if partner bids 3NT we will make it, and if he doesn't we will have done what we can.

I win the opening lead and duck a spade. My plan is to revoke on the second round of hearts, which should lead to down at least four. With luck, this will mean that the person who bid 3♦ at his second turn will never play with me again.

Pass. Hope we make it. Partner is under some pressure to raise to game with a hand that would have bid about two and a half spades if his RHO had not pre-empted. We won't make a slam, or even the five level, facing some of those hands. ♠KJxx ♥xx ♦Ax ♣AQxxx is a possible hand for partner, and not even a minimum.

Don't be so hard on yourself - the line you suggest is ingenious and the lie of cards you envisage is certainly possible (though perhaps not all that likely). But if you were a world-class player intending to throw East in with the singleton ♦A, you might change the order of your plays slightly. Ruff the second spade when in dummy with ♣A, cross to ♥J and play a diamond. This succeeds just the same when East does have the singleton ace, and avoids looking remarkably foolish when he does not.

You must try to remember that Han is a mathematician. As such, he recognises 13 as a prime number, but does not recognise the integers on either side of it as numbers at all. He is more likely to present a hand with 14 cards than a hand with 12, because 14 (with only two divisors) is more nearly a prime than 12 (which has four divisors). But if he would sit for 1M doubled with ♠xx ♥x ♦AQxxx ♣AJxxx and yet be unwilling to double 1M in the passout seat having opened 1♦, then ... well, I'd not award him the Fields Medal for contributions to consistency, would you?

Used correctly, maybe, although the English are aware from contact with Roland and other Great Danes that the Norsemen speak our language far better than we do. But how could you misspell it? I take it you already know of tough and bough and cough and dough, but even sew..

This means, if I have understood aright, that if we had: ♠xx ♥AQxx ♦xx ♣AKJ9x we would not re-open after 1♣-[1SP]-Pass-Pass. I would consider it absurd not to re-open. I mean, what in the name of reason are we supposed to do if partner has a penalty double of 1♠ - by far his likeliest holding, unless LHO is some Kokish-freak? Or is he supposed to bid (and if so, what?) with such as ♠AQ10xx ♥KJx ♦xx ♣Qxx? It's all very well to say that opener is meant to re-open only with shortness in the overcalled suit. But time after time (and this includes World Championship play) this policy leads to joke results - on more than one occasion, opponents have successfully sacrificed in 1♥ down four or five against 4♥ the other way. True, in those days they used to overcall in four-card suits more often than they do nowadays. But still..

Indeed, but the problem presented was one in which the 1♥ overcaller bid 2♦. I don't have a signature on this forum, but I am inclined to modify one that exists already: I don't mind replying to joke questions, but would you mind not asking only joke questions? We already have one Han. It's true that in the problem you meant to present instead of the one you did present (which was actually quite interesting): if you double and partner bids 2♦, you might feel uneasy. You should not. He will make it, or go down one at worst, and it will be your side's best spot. How, if you think about it, could it be otherwise? As you say (believing it a miracle) your partner had five diamonds and yet bid 1NT! Good for him - maybe he had a few hearts also, and maybe with six diamonds and less promising hearts, he would have bid (gasp) 2♦.

Would certainly double 1♥ (after all, in the good old days, if partner had doubled 1♥ for penalty I would assuredly sit for it). His double of 2♦ is nowadays defined as "I have a penalty double of 1♥ and some defence against diamonds". He expects me to pass it out and for us both to lead trumps, and maybe I should be happy to co-operate with this plan. On the other hand... at unfavourable vulnerability and with those clubs, maybe 600 in 3NT is 300 better than we can get defending diamonds. At any other colors I would pass without a qualm. At these... well, partner can see them also, and understands the issues, so I would pass with many a qualm.

Maybe I should rebid 2♠ over 2♦. Then, if partner does not support spades in the later auction but shows some enthusiasm for diamonds, I can bid 7♥ (or 7♦) with confidence. If he does support spades, maybe I will be well-placed to get a diamond cue out of him before asking for ♠Q. If, as intimated above, partner does not respond 2♦ but instead makes some control-showing response, I might still pretend that spades or diamonds, not hearts, was my main suit. But I am not familiar with control-showing responses to a strong 2♣. They work very badly over a strong 1♣, and there is every reason to suppose that they will work worse a level higher.

Both opponents follow to ♥A, West with the nine, East with the three. If you now play a club, West plays the queen and East the two. You're still alive. Try to stay that way.

Ruff a heart and lead a spade towards the queen. If East plays the king, unblock the queen. Win the club shift with the ace and play a spade to the nine (catering for a West had such as ♠10xxx ♥KQxx ♦Qxx ♣Kx). If West has ♠K, you can expect the club finesse to succeed. Of course, one could equally well run the queen of spades at trick four, intending to play as above (and not blowing an overtrick when both black-suit finesses are right). But leading towards the queen may give you slightly more chance of not losing to ♠K10 doubleton with East, since with that holding he will probably play the ten (he does not know that you don't have two little spades).

[hv=d=n&v=b&n=s98hj72dq4cak10763&s=shakq10864dk752c98]133|200|Scoring: Chicago[/hv] South opens 4♥ after two passes. East bids 4♠ after two more passes. North bids 5♥ after two more passes. West bids 5♠ after two more passes, and South bids 6♥ after... but the reader will be ahead of me by now. East doubles, after guess what, and West leads the king of spades. Plan the play. (None of those passes was particularly forcing, and double was not Lightner).

Would bid 1NT. Don't mind pass, and don't much mind double. 1♠ is vile. 2♣ is urvile.

I have generally found it counter-productive to splinter when I have first-round control in both unbid suits. Partner, with first-round control in neither and perhaps no control at all in one or both, is not likely to bid above game almost whatever his hand, and 4♦ leaves him no room to bid below game.

He won't notice it anyway. But very few players are cold-blooded enough to lead a low trump from Jx against a grand slam, especially one bid in this fashion. That being so, you should (in my view) play as gnasher suggests: ♠AK and a spade ruff, rather than starting with heart ruffs that might lead to a later overruff. As usual, it did not matter what you did. Trumps were 2-2, East had three hearts to the king, West had the queen of diamonds, spades were 4-3. One of the sad things about bridge is that most of the thinking you do is a complete waste of time. I guess the main difference between the best and the rest is that the best do it anyway, on deal after deal after deal, just in case it isn't a waste of time.