andy_h

System is bad. Having said that, North should make some sort of move. 2 aces, fifth trump, 5422, gotta make a bit of noise at the risk of playing at the 5-level which is usually fine.

I like a style where I can choose between opening 1M or 1NT (although you'd generally need some system follow-ups after 1M-1NT or 1H-1S). If I can choose, I would almost always choose to open 1M with a small doubleton, so 1H is what I would open here.

6D, I'm feeling lucky. But I'm afraid if 6C might be the better contract.

Click here My partner (unintentionally) got to this 11 card ending - not sure if it counts since she had to lose the final trick (though it would have made it so much better if somehow South had the ♦K for a double whammy but unfortunately the contract would have failed at that point). Thanks to this thread I was able to see and appreciate these kind of endings and mentioned it to the table, however nobody else seemed to be as fond of the ending as I was.

Something similar: http://www.bridgebase.com/forums/topic/49237-double-q/

If we hit partner with a major, haven't we rightsided? Don't we prefer to have the lead going into partner's hand?

On number 2, maybe I'm being a perfectionist, but I would prefer it to have a spade stopper. I understand that in other types of auctions such as 1m-(1S)-Dbl-(Pass); 1NT or 1m-(2S)-Dbl-(Pass); 2NT where the NT bid may not have a stopper (which is OK since 4th seat didn't support), but here on this auction the opponents have bid and raised spades - I'm not sure why we must wrongside the NT's now. I guess the only time where the hands that contain no spade stoppers will be ones that are exactly 3=3=4=3 shape since with a doubleton spade you would have another 4 card suit (or 5 diamonds) to bid with. So I guess what I'm saying is with a 3=3=4=3 shape I prefer a 3C (or 3D?) lie than a stopperless 2NT. This way we can still get to 3NT from the right side (or 4H on a 4-3 if need be), and partner won't (shouldn't?) be quick to get excited to play in 5m when I could have some balanced hand such as 3=2=4=4.

I open 1m (whichever is systemic). These aces are too good especially when they're coupled with a nice honour combination in both majors. The stray jack of clubs is a negative feature, but not enough to persuade me not to upgrade. I guess on average partner will have 7 highs and he will never be stayman-ing my 1NT opening (sometimes with 8 highs too). I guess it's not about wanting to "upgrade this to an 18-19NT" but rather hoping for the auction 1m-1M-3M-4M when partner will be passing a 1NT opening. Yes I may get to bad 4M game, but sometimes it gets us to a good game, or a bad one that makes, and I'm willing to risk it rather than to play in 1NT. As a side note, last two times I opened 1m with these type of hands, one it got us to a cold game when partner had the exact hand type I described (balanced 4234 with 7 highs) when the rest of the field played in 1NT+3, and second time partner had a complete yarborough and opponents bid to an aggressive 3NT doubled for one off - take it for what you will.

3D is an invitational jump shift and I'm looking at ♦AKTx and a void in clubs? Nice, I will bid 5D over RHO's double - I'm expecting to make this, and I wouldn't be surprised if it makes an overtrick!

Don't really know what 4C is but looking at this auction and vul I'm afraid one (or both) of the opponents are jokering.

No blame. It's truly unlucky that East has the worst possible junk and N/S don't have game on. When I open 1M with a 7 card suit and get raised by partner, I quite like just bidding game and it has worked out well for me - I don't see this hand as an exception. So many things can go right such as pushing the the opponents too high to defend at the 5-level, or we go one off when 4m/5m was making etc. What I don't want to do is to mingle around at the 3-level giving the opponents free reign to exchange some information to know whether they should be bidding 5m to make or to save because I'm sure if we don't bid 4H now we will be doing that on the next round of the auction. Give them the last guess.

Yes I bid 2NT and I don't find it that scary, I want to fight for the partscore looking at my singleton heart. If RHO does have clubs, then there's a good chance that either partner will have a diamond fit for us, or LHO will compete further in hearts.

Was this teams? If so, did your teamies play in 1DX making two?

(2). If partner responds 2H I will raise to game, if partner responds 2S I will invite with 3S. I hope we are playing something along the lines of 1NT-2C; 2D-2H; 2NT as a maximum with no fit (passing with min) just in case we have an invite based on distribution rather than HCP.

Double, not close.