Week 1 Charity evening in aid of the Disasters Emergency Committee (DEC) Ukraine Appeal. 

Our new 12-week program of Bridge kicked off this evening with a charity event that raised over £400 for the DEC Ukraine appeal. Forty-eight players attended and the evening began with puddings followed by 14 boards of friendly Bridge.

The results along with the hands are HERE - click on a pair to see the boards and the travellers.

Sally has provided the following commentary on Board 10, shown below - East was the dealer with a nice 16 points. Some players around the room will have been playing a 'strong NT' system of bidding, meaning that their 1NT opening shows 15–17 points, and will have opened with that on this hand. Others, playing a 12–14 1NT bid, will have opened 1S. Over the 1S opening, West responds 2C (10+ points, 4+C) and then E would rebid 2NT to show that strong, balanced type of hand. So whichever 'system' of bidding you play, E will have shown their strength and balanced shape with their first or second bid. Now down to West to decide what to do next!

W has only 11 points, not overly exciting, but just look at that shape! Particularly having an 8-card suit - those don't come around very often! And we're expecting partner to have at least 2 clubs opposite, which means we have a really powerful fit and we can almost certainly contribute 7 (or maybe even 8) club tricks to the pot when it comes to playing the hand. And that's before we even think about our AS and KD. We need very little from partner really to get us to 12 tricks on this hand - and partner has a strong hand for us here.

Another great aspect of West's hand is that he knows that he has a 'control' in all the suits. A 'control' is some way of stopping the opponents taking the first 2 tricks in a suit against you - never a good start if you are in a slam! So, a 'control' could be an A or a K, or a singleton or a void, any of those would stop the opponents taking those first 2 tricks in the suit, these holdings basically give you some control over the suit which is crucial in slam contracts.

There isn't really any clever, scientific way of bidding this hand for West. Even asking partner how many aces they have is difficult here, partly because your suit is clubs but mainly because you have a void. Over a 1NT opening you could start with a 3C bid showing a hand interested in a C slam, or over the 2NT rebid you could bid 4C again showing an interest in a C slam, but I think the practical approach is that W will just end up going for it and bidding 6C - very much based on their powerful club length and those controls in all the suits.

Well done to Patrick and Alan who did bid and make 6C on the hand, brilliant!