junyi_zhu

3NT, easy MP decision. If it's IMP, it would be rather hard.

Well, I feel this Italy team wasn't in its best shape although they won. As far as I have seen, the overall quality of the game wasn't very high comparing with their performance in late nineties, although they didn't win a world title at that time, their bridge was better I feel. Another thing I want to mention is that this pair has been considered as the third pair since they joined the team. Their overall performance was not bad, their card play has been good, but does that mean their bidding system is superior? I really doubt so. Still, nobody answered me from bridge logic so far. Do you think what I mentioned were holes of their system? Do you think they are fixable in their current frame work? I highly doubt so. You may not meet many 4-4-4-1 shape with about 12 HCP, but when you meet them, you would be in a worse position if you play their system. These holes may not show in a near future, however in a long run, if you have such kind of holes in your system, they will affect the overall performance a lot in your system.

One big problem is that your 3 level bids take up a lot of space and it's hard for responder to show his shortness, sometimes, it's very important.

agree, if playing straight forward 2/1, I'd bid exactly the same as Justin did. This is the only way to show club stiff honor which can be important for 3NT when partner's club stopper isn't very good. If playing my 2/1 structure, it would go like this: 1S 2D 2H(waiting, either balanced or minimum) 2S(waiting, no other choices, 3C need 5 clubs) 2N(second waiting, no other choice, 3D need 4 diamonds, 3H need 5 hearts) 3N(now it's rather straightforward, we don't have good fit, partner is quite balanced in nature, so 3NT should be the right spot. If partner has extra and balanced, he still can bid 4NT) This sequence actually only disclosed two suits...a lot of waiting bids. hehe.

I pass and I think it's close. The major disadvatage is the rank of suit, heart is always a problem. If you change the suit to spade, I'd bid for sure.

I pass and think pass is probably the best for long run. You might hit a jackpot if partner has a huge trapping hand, but you may also double them to game if partner's overall strength isn't very strong. Two level reopening gotta show some extra in nature.

1NT here as well. Seems we are the only two who bid 1NT here so far, Justin.

It depends on your partnership agreement. If you play pass to show either weak or penalty oriented hands, you should probably bid 4D to show H+D. With D one suiter, you can either double 3S or bid 5D yourself if you don't want to defence. 4S can be too high facing a broken partner. Double is also bad with a void.

that shows a maximum hand of your 2C rebid, gameforcing, but you still don't know the direction of the contract. It denies 3 card heart support.(I suppose you play this 2D as one round forcing) you may hold something like: SAx Hxx Dxxx CAKQxxx, you want to bid a game, but you don't know where you belong to. Partner may not hold a true diamond stopper sometimes: SKQJ HAQJxx Dxx Cxxx(bidding 2D just to check that if you hold 3 hearts)

My personal experience of systems based on a natural unlimited opener is that given sufficient work you can make your small slam bidding very accurate. Grand slam bidding still tends to be a bit of a problem for me, but fortunately rare. My personal experience is that against competent opponents you are seldom given a free run to slam after a precision 1C opener, and opportunities to use your greek asking bids are consequently likewise seldom. If you get a contested auction then you are better off from having made a more descriptive opener than a 1C bid that says nothing about distribution. There are always some difficult hands for any systems: Ax Axxxxx xx Axx vs, xx Kx AKQJxx xxx you want to be at 6D(needs H3-2 after a sp or club lead) , but I don't really think it's easy. after one heeart opening for either precision or natural systems. It may go like(for 2/1 GF systems): 1H 2D 2H 3D ? anything can be right and anything can be wrong. Suppose you bid 3H, and partner raises you to 4H, nobody would try for the slam. As I said before, the disadvantage of tradional 2/1 is that it's extremely hard to set up trumps in responder's 2/1 suit at low level by responder. Even if you play my 2/1 framework, you still might not find the slam: 1H 2D 2H(waiting, either minimum or balanced) 3D(extra, long D, denies 3 H support) 3H(6 hearts, minimum) 4H ? However, some old styled strong jumpshift players might have an easy day to bid this: 1H 3D(solid, set up trumps) 3H(6 hearts) 4H(support) 6D(easy, partner holds a solid diamond suit and a heart filler, and partner denies sidesuit controls, so partner must hold HK.) However, even if you play strong jumpshift, you may not play 1H - 3D as strong jumpshift, which means you lose the ability to show your solid diamonds at a lower level, especially when your hand isn't very strong.

For 1-1, you need two aces from partner to cover your losers. For 2-0, you need either two aces or the right AK to cover your losers. So 2-0 has more chance to be covered, that makes 2-0 a slightly better hand than 1-1 in offense. Also, if you need one cover card, the right KQ in your doubleton suit would cover one loser, and KQ are useless for 1-1 shape, also the right king can cover 1/2 losers. Still, the difference is not big, a lot of work needs to be done in bidding, including showing your position of the void or not showing your poisition of the void. For defence, when defnding against NT, you'd show up your void at the first trick, in the suit, so declarer can have a better idea of the distribution of that suit, for 1-1, you disclose your shape at the second round. When defending against suit, partner needs to find your void to give you a potential ruff for 2-0 case.

This one isn't very simple, suppose partner has a very useful 7 points, Axxxx xxx Kx xxx, do I really want to play 4S here? Perhaps no, because I may face a serious trump upper cut problem, if I pass, we probably defeat the contract by 1 trick. However, if you change partner's hand to SAJTxx Hxxx DKx Cxxx, I am sure I want to be in 4S, is that asking too much from partner? Probably. So I'd say it's not an easy hand.

I think major suit oriented canape is very useful for strong 1C opening systems. So one level major suits are of first priority to open even when responder holds longer minor suits. A relay structure is need for such openings though. This is the fastest way one can show her major suits and often that's killing. So 1D openin can thus deny major suit holding for this system(exception is that you may hold a 7 or longer minor suit) Still, this is just the general guideline for such a canape system. Still a lot of work needs to be done to improve the bidding accuracy. Also, one should probably discard the idea of bidding shorter minor suit when holding longer major suit, it shouldn't work in many situations, especially when opps compete heavily.

How many Club honours would you have to move to spades before you decided that you could no longer afford to suppress the spades on the 4-1-2-6 hand? Eric With any 7 card minor suits(perhaps except very weak 7 card suits), I think one should bypass 1S regardless his hand strength. With strong 6 card minor suits(that suit is playable facing a singleton), he should probably bypass weak spade suits. The logic here is that with 7 cards in hand, it usually plays well in your 7 card suits. This principle is also true when raising partner, with Sxxx HKxx DKQJxxxx C-, facing a 1S opening, I'd bid 1NT and hope to show my diamonds next round unless partner shows 6 spades in the next round, in that case, I'd raise him. It's even true when you do 2/1 GF, suppose you hold SAxx HKxx DKQJTxxx, you should bid 2D over 1S and probably rebid 3D(which is GF) to bypass your support in spades. If you belong to slams, diamond is the most likely trump suit than spades. Your partner can easily hold SJT9xx HAQx Dx CAKxx, in this case, 6D would be the only makable slam. This can be called when to raise your partner and when not to raise your partner issue. Another situation to bypass your 4 card spades is when you are balanced and rather weak, Sxxxx Hxx DKJTx CQT9x, you probably want to bid 1NT here and hope to be able to play it if partner passes with balanced minimum. Even if your partner holds 4 spades, you still may have a good play in NT. The basic idea is that when you are weak, you can't lose very good 4S in this situation, and even if you have 8 cards fit in spades, you still may belong to 3NT. We all know 4S is quite hopeless if partner holds Qxxx AKQJx DAx CKx, but 3NT has way better chance to make.

Well, your words may sound insulting to some people, but I don't mind them at all. All I want to say is to present my thoughts in a neutral way, even when I talked about myself. I never had an implication that I am strong, I am smart, my partners or teammates are not so good. in that sense, cloning doesn't help either, because environment changes people a lot. All I want to say is that everybody can reach to the top of the level if they work hard and minimize their partnership misunderstandings if they treat their partners as themselves. Still the last thing I want to present is that a team of 4 consisting only B/D, L/V can probably win those things as well. If you take the matter this way, you would pretty much understand what I was talking about.

I also voted 2S, the better bid in theory. This take out of 2D in nature is a take out in three suits. A most common holding is something like this: SAQxx HKxxx Dx CJxxx. Without spades, you can just bid 2H over 2D and hope to survive there. So gain of the double is that it shows your spades which can be very important no matter in MP or IMP. However, for this hand, it's still a tough decision, because your spades were quite small. If partner doubles with three spades, 2S might not play very well. But that's less likely if opps holds 8 diamonds, because with 9 cards in C and H, about 10 HCP, partner may act earlier. I don't mind a double with Axx KJxx x QTxxx over 1D p 1S. Also, I hope I can pass 2D with Axx Kxxx xx Qxxx, although I know many would bid.

Well, is this USA team the best of the world? I really doubt so. Even China's team almost blitzed them at round robin stage. Also, two copies of myself mean no misunderstandings in bidding and defensive signals, that's a huge edge. You lose a match usually not because opps play too well, usually because you have had too many misunderstandings in your partnership. The third thing, I have probably the one of the best 2/1 systems in the world. The last thing, I might not be the best now, but who knows in ten or twentry years what will hapeen. Still, they win many events doesn't mean their system is superio. If a system has many holes, it can't last long in my humble opinion.

I think its probably playable since they won european championships and olympiad. Well, with so strong teammates, two copies of myself can also win those things.

You mean you take 2.15 from your opponents ? or else i didnt understnad you. If i understand right, do you consider a high mean as always good, always bad or usually good/usually bad ? I think its usually good but not always. In general i consider their system to a new age system, based on the consept of total tricks more then any other system i know. The main fault imo is the forcing 1 bids, but i cant say how bad this is. To me, this system is not playable for teamgame. Their 2 level opening can't guarantee 5 cards if you want to open AKxx AJTx x xxxx which is probably not a one level opening unless they distort their shape to open 1NT which I don't realy like. Another thing is that they don't even have weak 2, without weak 2, that means SAQJxxx Hxx Dxxx Cxx can not be opened. The third thing is that For some strong type of hands, they still have to open one level and rebid at two level, for which, other systems would simply make a jumpshift, and I've seen them miss a cold game about every 20 boards in this team olympic game. So I think overally, it's a match point system, it's pretty good at 2 level and 3 level bidding. But For game and slam bidding, I don't see it's good.

For AQxxx xx x AJxxx I believe you should treat it differently. Over 1S 2H, your hand is about 6 losers, so I'd bid 3C. Over 1S 2D, it's about 7 losers, so I'd bid 2S. You partner may hold SKx HAKxxx Dxxx CKQx, or SKx Hxxx DAKxxx CKQx and now you may see the difference. Partner's 2/1 suit does affect your loser count and hand evaluation for average cases, because long suits usually means more possible HCP in that suit.

So 6S opening means partner should bid 7S would SA and pass otherwise, right?

2H can destroy opps' constructive method over 2C opening, especially when your opps are not of worldclass standard. I know many expert partnership don't even have a good gadget against overcalls of their 2C openings. Also, I prefer a suction 2D here to make the matter more interesting. Still, against world class oppositions, it's still probably right to bid 2H, the risk is rather low, and you do take up some bidding space from them.

There should be more options, I spent most of my time practice bidding at BBO actually, hehe.

haha, Justin, so you'd open 6S with 11 spades and hope for 1-1, right? That's a sound a opening I'd say.