skjaeran

Sven doesn't tell the whole story about the Norgegian regulations. In Swiss teams or RR teams with short matches, each match is considered a session. In each match the home team has seating rights . Thus it's totally proper for a pair to switch directions from round to round. Most teams play with one pair always in the open room and the other in the closed. Movements like Mitchell aren't used much here.

Looking at what happened so far, it must be absolutely clear that passing 3♥x isn't a logical alternative for west here. Btw, I don't know any good players either, for whom 3♥ would be natural in this sequence. But I agree that pass is a LA for adv+ players.

I heard from Tor Helness some time ago that Curtis was very ill. Tor got the swine flu too, just as he was going back to Norway, but only had light fever for a couple of days. It's good to hear Curtis is recovering.

Obvious pass over 3♦. Also an obvious pass if partner whacks it. I'm not overruling partner with this hand if he wanted to double 2♦ and still wants to penalize opps after the raise. I've got about what partner should expect.

Double for me, planning to rebid 3♦ over 2NT (leb) or 3♣. 3♦ is of course an overbid over 2NT. But there's so huge an upside to the double compared to overcalling 3♦ that it's clearly worth it IMO.

Can you quote the regulation which says "You should not sort your hand"? What's the point of this? L7C clearly says that you should shuffle your hand before you return it to the board. Shuffling is more or less the opposite of sorting (I'm aware that shuffling a hand could result in it being sorted into suits, but what's the odds of that happening???). So it should be pretty clear that sorting the hand after play is an infraction.

Systemic low heart for me. Only realistic alternative is a club. ♦A is totally out of the question for me, only a trump lead looks (slightly) worse.

2♠ for me, but would have openen 1NT.

Justin is probably right in his reasoning. I'm stuck with conventional wisdom though, at the moment, so straight, aces only, BW for me. :(

The OP states the agreement as 54/45 in the unbid suits and may be lighter than a TOX. From that it's clear to me that partner could also be stronger. (I've never played sandwich NT - natural is absolutely standard where I play.) 4522 and something like 15-17 hcp seems reasonable in this context. I'm bidding 4♠.

Can't judge the sanity part. I'd make a simple raise to 3♠. My values are a little too soft for a strong raise (3♥) and too scattered for a fit-non-jump (3♣).

Well, i disagree. 1) Only two posters seems to support this, while many, and indeed some of the respected posters, seems to have no problem. 2) My opening post has attracted 30 comments directly discussing the stated problem. This is far above average for this forum. 3) Opinions has been discerning in this forum, so it seems to me it was worth discussing. I only revealed the full deal out of politeness, because somebody asked for it. As far as I can see, every single poster who commented on the overcall disagreed strongly with it (with varying degree of ridicule). I doubt any poster here would have overcalled 1♦ with this hand.

1. 1♦, pass 1NT, raise 2NT to game. 2. 1♠, rebid 2♠

Obvious game try IMO. I'd make a short suit game try in diamonds if that's available. Else a help suit game try in hearts.

I'd have passed 4♦. Now I double, of course. I lead the ♥A. If there's no ruff, I most probably will switch to diamonds.

2♣..2NT for me, clear upgrade. Prefer offshape strong NT over the alternatives.

I agree on your last part. But then it belongs in the B/I forum. A/E players should know what first action to make after a 1♣ opening holding an absolutely normal t/o double. The given auction in itself would indeed present an interesting problem if our hand fitted a 1♦ overcall. I'd suggest not revealing the complete hand when that makes the whole auction ridiculous. It should be good enough if asked to tell that the auction was a total mess, which created an interesting problem.

The ten only picks up one singleton, the 9 offside, whereas low towards the jack pick up any singleton honour onside (two splits).

There are several gadgets available over 1♣ to make life easier. I prefer: Transfer responses 1NT=10-12 (6-9 is in the 1♠ response together with diamond hands) 2♣=GF raise 2 red = transfers (weak or strong) 2♠=8-11 unbal/semibal raise 2NT=13+ bal GF

My meta rules say these 2♦ bids are cuebids.

1. 1NT, playing 15-17 NT I'd open 1NT, see no reason not to rebid 1NT now. 2. Pass 3. 3NT, would have made a neg x earlier

Agree with Justin, cash the ♠K and watch partners suit preference to know what to switch at trick three.

Late to this. Agree with LOLing the 1♦ overcall - t/o double is more than obvious. I'd raise 1♥x to 2♥. Can't see the point in NOT taking away opps bidding space her. Strange pass of 1♦ by partner, ridiculous double of 1♥ by RHO. Problems like this one, where most of the calls have little or no relation to the actual hand, really belongs somewhere outside the A/E forum.

1. X, passing 2♣. 2. 2♠, limit raise

♦5, might work out as either passive or active, the least dangerous lead.