Tramticket

Yes - I never thought of the restricted choice implication. But even so, I don't quite buy it! :)

Surely you need West to hold at least three hearts and and at least two diamonds. AK♥, club to the king, Q♥ discarding a diamond, KA♦ then a diamond ruff.

Are we supposed to believe that declarer has AK10753 in trumps ans plays ace and then small? He will look rather silly if trumps are 2-2. I'm ducking.

I'm bidding. Let's push them a level higher. I don't understand the comments about bouncing them into game - this is much less a worry at match points.

For what it's worth, I do think that weak NT / 4-card majors is a good system. The combination of a weak NT and bidding the majors means that you have often forced the opponents to compete at the two-level (so much more dangerous). Yes you take up some of your own bidding space, but you are giving useful and precise information to your partner. I also live near London and play against many players playing a vast variety of systems (London is a very cosmopolitan place!). I am happy and confident playing our variant of Acol. Unfortunately Five-card Majors / Strong No Trump is becoming increasing dominant in world bridge - but I suspect that this is due more to the internet (including BBF/BBO) than intrinsic merit.

I can't really agree with this. It is true that very few top-level, world-class players play Acol. But since we are not at that level yet, Acol is perfectly playable. It is far more important to thoroughly know your system than to worry about which system to choose. The biggest difficulty with Acol for aspiring players is that there is less and less good quality material published.

Game forcing on 18-19 is still a bit much, even if the responses are up to strength. Personally I rebid 1NT on 15-18 and I am more relaxed with a 19-20 GF 2NT rebid. (But the wide range 1NT rebid does need more "system" to make it work).

Good luck with developing your system Liversidge. Opening the minor first is not my system (I will always open the major with two four-card suits) and I'm not sure that I am aware of any good MODERN books on this approach. Things to consider include: - Responses: As Stephen Tu noted above, if you are not always opening your four-card major, responder needs to respond in a four-card major rather than responding up-the-line (the preferred approach if you always open the four-card major). This is important as the major might get "lost" - particularly if the opponents interfere. - Rebids: Do you always rebid 1NT with a balanced hand in the strong NT range (relying on check-back to identify any major suit fit)? Or can you sometimes rebid the major? - Since you open a minor in preference to a major, the 1M opening will "often" show a five-card suit. A One Spade opening will nearly always promise a five-card suit (assuming you open 1H with 4-4 in the majors). When is it safe to raise (or compete) on a three-card suit?

Since this is meant to be the Novice / Beginner forum, let's get back to fundamentals: - Check and agree that you and your partner are playing the same basic system (note, for these purposes there is more than one version of Acol: Opening the Major first leads to a fundamentally different system to opening the minor - one post even suggested "Acol with five card majors" - this is a different system!). - At this stage any advantage from playing one system rather than another will be slight. Play the system that you have been taught and/or is used by most people at your club. - Learn your system in depth. Learning the basic system is more important than adding more conventional gadgets. learn which bid to make, but also learn WHY a particular bid is recommended. - When you are ready to add conventions to the system, make sure that they are compatible with the bidding system that you play and logically consistent with other conventions that you play. (Be careful with a forum such as this - you will receive well-meaning advice from some players based on their own systems rather than yours!).

2C. Suit quality is good and I certainly want a club lead.

There are a few things here. - firstly you need to agree your basic system before discussing add-ons. It really does make a big difference which four-card suit you are going to open and this will have an impact on your whole bidding structure. Discuss and agree this first. - I agree with Stephen Tu, if you are going to open a minor much of the time when holding a four-card major it seems better to have the certainty of a five-card suit when you do open the major. Personally, I play Acol and will always open a major before a minor. This is the usual modern approach in the UK. - If you choose to open the minor first, you either have to rebid a major (hiding the balanced shape) or rebid no trumps (hiding the major - Initially). If you choose the second option, check back, will help as long as responder has enough strength.

Part of this is partnership style and philosophy. Do you have the sort of partnership where one partner takes control, asks the questions and his partner is simply expected to respond: "yes" or "no" based on tightly defined questions. For me the game try says: - I have invitational values. [Remember invitational hands can vary enormously and a help suit isn't always clear cut]. - This is a suit where I may need some help. It also asks partner whether he/she can help in the search for game - Do they have helpful high cards in the suit? - Or helpful shortage? - Or general overall strength? I expect both partnership members to exercise judgement. On the example hand my judgement would be to bid game.

I have followed your link. There is a lot of data there and I'm not sure that I understand it all. I certainly don't understand what is the source of the data (so I'm taking that on trust). But if I understand correctly the table shows that a 4441 hand will take 8.61 tricks on average playing the contract (in the partnership's best suit?) on a double dummy basis and 4.85 tricks in defence (in the defender's best suit?) on a double dummy basis. I may have mis-interpretted - if so I apologise. The table certainly makes interesting reading and I am interested and surprised that the 4441 shape has a relatively high trick taking potential playing the contract. I guess that the tricky part of this is identifying the correct strain. The data also seems to support my assertion that 4441 hands have a lot of defensive strength. the figure of 4.85 appears to be higher than for any other hand shape (except 10-3-0-0 shape but I suspect rogue data there!!). So I do think there is some evidence to support the suggestion that there is less rush to dive into the auction on this shape. If we perform a simple calculation [Tricks playing the contract] less [tricks in defence] it appears that the value is lowest for the three shapes that we treat as balanced (4333, 4432 & 5332), which is no surprise. That's why we open these hands 1NT (or rebid 1NT - depending upon NT range). 4441 hands sit somewhere in between these balanced hands and the rest of the unbalanced shapes - which is what I would intuitively expect. All very interesting - some of this surprises me and some fits my expectations. Thank you for this link. I'm still not rushing to open 4441 hands. I will open nearly all 12 counts, but very few 11 counts.

Some interesting thoughts here. Nevertheless, the 4441 shape does often have a low Offence/Defence ratio (an ugly phrase - but everyone understands it). So there is some validity in PhilG's argument that there is no rush to enter the bidding on marginal hands - he just takes it too far (NOBODY passes a 13 count!). The key is to continually re-evaluate through the auction, as the hand can grow if you find a fit - particularly a nine-card fit - and especially so if there is no wastage opposite the singleton. I agree that holding 4441 with 4-4 in the majors offers great game chances. Unfortunately 4441 hands with a singleton club are particularly difficult for the Acol system.

It feels to me as if the opponents are likely to have a double fit in the majors, and we have a double fit in the minors. I'll bid 5♦

Really?? Opening post described 4D as a splinter, in case it wasn't obvious.

I agree with Stephen.

3NT is more usually based on a long running suit. Double with any hand too strong for the 2NT overcall.

What is 2H? 4th suit forcing? The opening post doesn't alert. If it is 4sf, I would bid 2NT. If it isn't 4sf, then our hand has suddenly grown in strength - but I don't know what continuations I can now bid, that are forcing?

Easy 2H. Or better still, a multi 2D. (Hence my vote for 'other'). 😃

I must admit that, even at club level, I tend to avoid clubs that don't have access to a dealing machine.

Thanks - yes, I said my maths was rusty! I'm feeling a bit happier about bidding the grand B-)

I think that they have probably got beyond bad shuffling and dealing by hand in the Quarter Finals of the USBC in Denver! :P

I did: 3-3 break = 36% 4-2 break = 48% => so 4-2 and club finesse = 24% Total 60% But I may be wrong - its many years since I studied probability theory!

If I read this correctly (not easy), the diamond loser goes on the ace/king of spades