gordontd

Would anything other than a diamond have been any better?

I think he was referring to the WBF convention card, which can be downloaded from the Ecats site via a link from the EBU site, but not directly from the EBU site (because, in most EBU events, it is proscribed). I bet if David had realised it would create this much difficulty in understanding, he wouldn't have made his response to Matt's typo!

I expect that what we might last week have considered to be inconsistency, this week we see as the superior judgement of a Gold Cup winner :)

Would you consider this hand good enough to UCB in response to a debased second-seat one-level overcall?

It's the card that's proscribed, not the methods.

That's the American way, but it's not a global standard.

"Gerber is a bad convention, like many others, when it's used in inappropriate situations". I don't think it should be put much more strongly than that.

.Deleted

If he had all the cards we need for slam, he might well have bid something other than 4♠

That's fine if they have some documentary evidence that that's how they play. Absent that, I don't think we give them the benefit of agreements we're making up for them.

It's not a good way to show this hand if it's going to get ruled back whenever partner thinks before signing off. If he thought his hand was too strong for 3♣, he could have bid 3♦, 4♦ or 4♠

1 - It avoids the rebid problem of 4522 hands after 1♥-1NT, and it allows you to play 1♥-1♠ as showing five. 2 - It's a waste of a bid to deal with a minor problem. 3 - I haven't heard of it. 4 - Agree to play that a 2♣ rebid only promises two. Or rebid a good five-card heart suit.

No, it wasn't fouled. In an individual, whether teams or not, I doubt if you would do this even if you knew who it was. [edit: I misunderstood it as an individual; you seem to have understood it as a head-to-head teams; it may well have been multiple teams] Unless I've mis-read the original post, I think that would lead you to rule that the claim is not good - which is why objections were raised.

The usual thing is to work backwards asking players which hands they held. If you have travellers or Bridgemate results, you can often get a good idea where the error was most likely to have been introduced and check there first.

I agree with your overall argument, but I would be looking to L70A. I certainly think it is a doubtful point as to what declarer meant, and so it should be resolved against him.

Why would you define it like that? It seems obvious to me that West should be defined as the person holding the West cards. You don't call yourself East when you are North in an arrow-switch, do you Paul?

I've not found difficulty with this. Perhaps because this is the land of the arrow-switch, where most of us experience this every game we play, it just seems obvious that our position is not immutable and so the position on the board is the one we use.

OB11C3

You're talking about players who ignore the Stop card. I was talking about those who shorten the pause.

Oh, yeah, sure, and the fact that a one CLUB opening in those systems was STRONG is simply co-incidental :lol: I wonder if you think that strong club systems where the minimum strength of the 1♣opener is 14 or 15 hcp (like Moscito) are not strong club systems at all?

I've noticed that many people have trouble distinguishing "two" from "three" when their hearing declines. This doesn't matter much in the play, but it does when using spoken bidding. When I first learned to play with my grand-mother (who was a bit deaf) we used to get round this by saying them in Swahili - "mbili" is not at all like "tatu"!

You seem to assume that the double shows clubs, but it might not. In any case, there's no need to have a cue-bid available at this point in the auction - you can just bid naturally.

Absolutely.

The WBF give the following definition of strong: high card strength a king or more greater than that of an average hand. So, if you wanted to play your strong club as showing 13+, that would seem to be acceptable under WBF regulations.

I don't see any need to avoid taking advantage when the opponents have accepted an insufficient bid. It certainly doesn't seem to be a legal requirement. The problem is that you might well actively disadvantage yourself, since your partner is unlikely now to expect spade support from you, and there's no certainty that partner will continue bidding as though your second bid was your first. What would 2♠ now mean - a transfer to clubs?