nikos59

Perhaps it has already been posted (thread is too long to check completely) but I am a believer in what the great Edgar Kaplan wrote: "I do not guarantee I'll never open one notrump holding a five-card major, but so far in a long bridge career I have never found the occasion to do so." He wrote this in 1996, one year before his death. Nikos

Add a button for psychic bids, says Chamaco. Then, add another button (or a semibutton?) for semi-psychics. Yet another button perhaps for tactical bids. A good idea would also be to add a button for when you are walking the dog, as they say. This button could have the shape of a dog for mnemonic reasons. Another button, when you misclicked a previous bid. With all those buttons, perhaps the screen will be cluttered; if this is the case, we may remove superfluous buttons like the suit/numbers etc. After all, who will want to play bridge except perhaps for lawyers? n.

To Chamaco: You say that if pard holds AJTx KQxx x xxxx over the reopening, he must bid 4H. This (i.e. the "he must bid" part) is going too far, isn't it? I mean, hasn't partner seen us passing? Why on earth should he be keen on hanging us for reopening as a passed hand, i.e. for contesting the partial? Has this pard never played matchpoints? (I assume the original setting was matchpoints). Can't this partner count to 13? Because any counting partner knows that not only me but also the fourth player is short at clubs. In my humble opinion, any sensible partner holding the above hand will immediately guess that most likely points at the table are 10 apiece (give or take a jack) for everyone and will pass speedily. Even thinking to bid with this hand above is an overbid and an insult to partner. After all, if partner is a passed hand and I am a passed hand and the contest is matchpoints, I am assured of a fine score with 170 and I leave 3H well alone. nikos

Playing today with an understanding partner (first time with him though) and against two self-declared advanced partners (also pickups) I held nv against v: 9 J632 Q10753 K93 Partner deals and passes, RHO opens 2S weak. What do you bid? Why, an obvious 2NT -natural, 16-18 with a spade stopper. LHO had a 18-point 2-2-4-5 hand, and he passed. Partner passed, opener rebid 3S... and this was passed out. Declarer made six. Half of the field was in slam. The other half in game. It transpired that opener had AKJxxxx in spades plus the queen of hearts. Serves him right for opening a weak 2 with seven cards B) ns

To Chamaco: sorry, bad expression: I had an opening *weak 2* hand, and I have lied to pard by passing. The rest of my dissertation stays unchanged n

To Chamaco: Which "discipline"? This is a clearly aberrant situation that I was found at, I mean having passed with a clear opening bid. To be consistent, I have to show my suit. For instance, if you bid 1NT with 20 points aren't you later going to show the extra ace if you can? It is the same here: Someone passed with a sixth heart, he then gave me his cards, I cannot not show the sixth heart. After the board, if there's a disaster, I explain to pard.

I assume i just stepped in, because I would have opened the hand with a 2H. Well, I would bid 3H. nikos

I am not so sure about all this... let's suppose there is no intervention, then it goes: 1C - 1S 2S(?) - pass (?) I am not sure North is worth a 3S rebid without the intervention and the overcall has not improved much North's hand. If you are so keen on applying charges, then it is perhaps *South* who could make a forward move, on the strength of his club fit. But I would absolve both partners -if this is the worst bidding blunder you make, I don't want to play against you :unsure:

Seems genial! Thx!

Nope, it is already set in English... the program is too smart, alas Thx anyway Nikos

Hi all I just installed the new version of the program (actually, it was installed by itself when I logged to BBO) and it may be very fine but it presents a side-effect which is very annoying for me. My PC's default language is Greek, so I get the message that my language is not available and English will be used instead. No problem so far, BUT... but when I am offline and doubleclick on a lin file at my hard disk, I still get this message, EACH AND EVERY time that I open a lin/pbn file. Now, when I am perusing old records I may open hundreds of files in a session -and I don't want to see hundreds of times the message and hear hundreds of times the beep. Not to mention that it is totally useless because I am using the offline viewer. Is there any way to avoid it? Nikos PS Needless to say, the program is still precious, but...

Luis, if you take the heart finesse (after the club finesse succeeds, I mean) you really deserve to lose the finesse and then also suffer a club ruff :) Why heart finesse? Is this matchpoints? Even if it is matchpoints, are you sure all the field will bid slam? n

In my opinion, and despite the fact that Ben's article about signalling is very well written, if you really are an intermediate player (or a beginner) you should try to play a *very simple* signalling system. If you are trying to "read" something into each and every card partner plays, you are most probably assured of a headache, very bad results and an irate partner. It is much better to try and exercise your mind into simple counting-inferring gymnastics while you are defending, i.e. how many points has declarer? what shape? etc. For this reason, I would recommend to show only count, either standard or upside down. If you already play standard, by all means keep it, it isn't worth to switch. You'll lose more by miscounting-straining your mind than what you might gain, once in a purple moon, by not wasting your 9s. Optional: You may want to add to this what is called "premiere defausse italienne" in French, which in English is, I guess, odd-even, or perhaps Roman discard: 3,5,7,9=I want, 2,4,6,8=dont want and want the lowest/highest of the two remaining suits. This is valid only for the 1st discard. Not for the subsequent discards, not when you follow suit. But still better is to find partners who are able to think. Much later, when you no longer are a beginner, you may want to complicate your understandings with your regular partner. On the other hand, I have made a helluva lot of unmakeable contracts against "expert" pairs who were following elaborate signal agreements and making absurd switches because pard had played the 4 instead of the 3. n

Ben: Your modified line of play is still worse re blockage in the case of trumps 3-1, because now they will *know* to play a spade. In my line, they don't know I have a diamond left, since I didn't hasten to ruff it, so they may be afraid of the ruff-sluff. Anyway, for my part I refuse to ruff that diamond in dummy as long as enemy trumps are out :) Queens and nines are precious. n

Your partner is a result merchant; if enemy clubs were 4-3 he wouldn't have uttered a word. Your bid was perfect.

Dunno about experts, here is what I think. My first thought was to ruff immediately the diamond and run the queen of trumps. But I was a bit nervous about this, because I am missing K and 10 of trumps. The line I finally chose is to start with the queen of clubs at Trick2. If this loses, I need to find the hearts. If this wins, I bang down the ace of hearts as a safety play, clear trumps and later make good the clubs for a discard of spade loser. Why start from clubs? First of all, ruffing the diamond, although in abstract is a good move (elimination), weakens prematurely dummy's trump holding. And then, even if the queen of trumps is covered, you still do not know what to do on the next round of trumps. On the other hand, after the club finesse everything is more limpid. Anyway, that's what I would play.

2NT 100% of the blame Pass gets the rest Both of South's bid are horrible; when you have a pickup partner you MUST show immediately support if you have it; if not, you are the sole guilty for any accident that may happen. But our star here compounded the felony by passing the double, hence 200% guilty :D

I do not psych often, although I do like to "take a view" (I mean, to bid differently from the majority) quite often. But I cannot agree with the position that psychics kill the game; for one thing, when bridge made regularly first-page news (in the 30s) there was one psychic per three hands or so. For another, every great bridge player has psyched at least once. It is difficult to find a top player more concerned with ethics than Michael Rosenberg, yet it is well known than in the 1992 Olympiad final, first to speak at favourable, he opened 1NT on: 9752 - J64-A7-Q754 Partner had a flat 11-count and drove to 3NT; the defenders (no clods; Levy-Mouiel) could not fathom what was happening, so declarer scrambled 8 tricks. At the other table, the US made 2NT holding the LevyMouiel cards, so the Rosenberg psychic actually gained 2 imps. I wonder if Flame believes that every time Rosenberg opens now 1NT at first position at favourable, his partner is Alerting opponents, "You know, back in 1992 he bid 1NT with a 7count!" n

The European Championships of Malmoe finished on Saturday morning with the more or less expected victory of Italy, which made it a (probably) unprecedented six-in-a-row. (I am not sure the original Blue Team had such an unbroken series of wins, anyone knows for sure?) Thanks to Bridge Base Online and other sites, there was ample Vugraph coverage of the event. At my Vugraph project page, I have collected some 130 lin files -on average 4 per round. The bulk of them come from the Open series, but there are also files from the Ladies and the Seniors. The page is at: http://sarantakos.com/bridge/vugraph/2004/2004-etc.html I may zip all of them in one big file in the future -but I am expecting to add and/or correct some of these files first, also after your feedback. As you'll see at the page, some files are indicated as "missing" wholly or partly. You MAY HAVE THEM on your hard disk if you happen to have watched online Vugraph, please look and eventually send them! Also, if you spot errors, please let me know. And, obviously, a great THANK YOU to Fred, Uday, Roland and all the Vugraph operators and the sometimes (unfairly) maligned commentators, for making possible this wonderful experience! KEEP UP THE GOOD WORK, GUYS! Nikos Sarantakos PS The European Championship in football is ending tomorrow, also with an unprecedented win :blink:))

1. Forquet's book with the Blue Team hands (don't remember the English title) 2. Reese's Bridge at the Top or Play bridge with Reese 3. Darvas "Right thru the Pack" On the other hand, there are some very useful books but not suitable for a desert island -unless there are bridge-playing natives there! (Hence, no 100% desert). Nikos

I hope you do not refer to myself. No -someone else said in this thread that on a particular match recently transmitted there were two commentators that had no idea of bridge and of the real world. This offending post apparently was considered kosher because it did not insult noone personally. As to the rest, my own view is that my gratitude towards BBO and the commentators is so immense that I consider it improper to criticize commentators -you know perhaps the proverb about looking a gift horse in the mouth.

Well said, Uday -and perhaps we would add the fact that very many commentators are not using their mother tongue when commentating, which makes the task appreciably more difficult. Still, there are always some esteemed users who will insist that some commentators have no idea of bridge and of the real world in general. Perhaps BBO would consider offering to them the chance to commentate -I am sure that we would all get a good laugh. n

What part of my post is deemed offensive? That of David Bird being quite entertaining? Or the one about my hunch re the original poster's reaction? If the latter, Chamaco himself has already given a quite decent reply. However, it seems to me a bit strange that Rona hadn't found offensive this previous pearl of wisdom in the same thread: <<In the match france against someone else, might well have been italy, I got...err... nerved of the commentators of having no idea of bridge nor the real world.>> But perhaps his thirst for censuring opinions is selective. ns

Perdonate l'italiano rustico, anche la auto-promozione, ma io avevo la stessa frustrazione per il Vugraph, un invenzione preziosa ma anche elusiva che nessuno ha voluto/potuto archiviare, quindi ho creato il mio proprio sito e ci sto archiviando tutto che viene trasmesso via BBO e anche altre cose. Il URL e: http://www.sarantakos.com/bridge/vugraph.html dove potete scegliere il anno et procedere. Per il Europeo di Malmoe: http://www.sarantakos.com/bridge/vugraph/2004/2004-etc.html Se trovate interessante il materiale, non è difficile ritornare la favore: se vedete che uno o altro match manca della collezione ("missing for the moment") e se l'avete conservato voi, vi prego di mandarmelo a: sarant-at-pt-dot-lu. Nikos Sarantakos

Well, I am a great Vugraph fan and I want to say that I strongly disagree with almost everything the original poster has written (except the assessment of Fred's commentating skills, obviously). Some transmissions during the last two months like the Polish trials-liga finals were a treat to watch, partly because of the high quality of commentating. I like all the instances where the "locals" can provide insights about the players (and they sometimes can predict with astonishing accuracy their decisions) I like their chatting in the local language. (Okay, I can understand several languages besides English). I don't mind about the occasional beer (or other) joke and apparently the original poster cannot realize how much of empty time there is to be filled during a Vugraph, where the players may spend long minutes on what is a boring board, flat as a pancake. In these instances, I (for one) very much prefer some witticism than some arcane analysis (if North underleads his ace and this and that then declarer may be denied his overtrick) that tries to instil interest to a board that by definition has none. The other day I was perusing my chat log file where commentating during Vugraphs is logged and it occurred to me that some witticisms, especially of David Burn are quite entertaining indeed; approaching in quality the "Kaplan nuggets" one might say -but the original poster would probably disagree with Kaplan witticisms as well. My hunch is that the original poster's reaction is probably due to the fact that he can no longer impart his pearls of wisdom on innocent commentators. n.