Lesson 4.

The Bidding.

1. Response to opening bids of 1NT, other than a direct raise.

1. The weakness take-out

          Generally speaking, holding less than 11 points, you pass partners opening bid of 1 NT.

If, however, you have a hand that is both very weak AND is unsuited to No Trump play, this contract might incur a hefty penalty.
Therefore a response of 2 in any suit except Clubs (the 2 Club bid has a special meaning) is treated as a cry of weakness and demands to be passed.
It warns partner that No Trumps will probably fail and that the hand will play better in the suit bid.
In order to be sure of that, you need to hold 6 cards in the suit (Occasionally it is bid on only 5 cards, but that will not always ensure an improved contract).
The point count for the bid is unimportant. Obviously we are talking about hands with less than 11 points, and the fewer points you hold,
the more important it is to get your partner out of his No Trump contract.

          This hand has only 3 points and partner could have as few as 13. Therefore your opponents hold anything from 22 to 24 points and will probably make 8 tricks in No Trumps.
Moreover, your long Heart suit is likely to be useless to partner. However, if Hearts were trumps, you should be able to make AT LEAST 2 tricks from your Heart suit.
Therefore you take out your Partners No Trump bid into 2 Hearts. This contract, too, may fail, but not as badly as 1NT.

b) The 2 Club bid: the Stayman Convention.

          As we saw in the last lesson, with the same number of high-card points, you will usually be able to make about 2 tricks more in a trump suit than in No Trumps
PROVIDED THAT YOU HAVE A TRUMP FIT, i.e. at least 8 cards in the suit between Declarers hand and dummy.

          Now when partner opens 1 NT he may well hold 4 cards in either Spades or Hearts (or even in both).
Therefore, if you have enough points to respond (11+) & a 4-card Major suit, the advantages of playing in a suit are such that you should investigate the possibility of 4-4 Major suit fit.

          You bid 2 CLUBS. This is known as the Stayman convention and it is why you can't use 2 Clubs as a weakness take-out.
This is the first artificial conventional bid you have met. It says absolutely NOTHING about your holding in the Club suit.
It merely asks the 1NT opener if he has a 4-card Major suit, and if so, to bid it! If he has no 4-card major suit, then he bids 2 Diamonds,
which is also artificial, since it says nothing about his Diamond holding. It merely denies a 4-card major.

Stayman in action. Assume opener has bid 1 NT, and as responder you've made the Stayman response of 2 Clubs.

Elementary play in No Trumps.

The hold-up

South is in a contract of 3NT and the lead is the King of Diamonds. He has 4 Spade tricks, 1 Heart trick and 1 Diamond trick in top tricks, a total of 6. He has to find 3 more tricks from somewhere.
The Club suit is the obvious candidate; once the Jack (say) has knocked out the Ace there will be 3 tricks available for the K, Q, and 10 of Clubs .
So you can take the first trick with the Ace of Diamonds and proceed to drive out the Ace of Clubs to set up your 3 tricks.

East will take the trick and return a Diamond to his Partners Q J 10 4, which will take the next FOUR tricks! Together with the Ace of Clubs that will make 5 tricks for the defence,
leaving only 8 tricks for Declarer, and the contract fails by one trick.

Declarer must refuse the first Diamond trick and the second when the suit is continued, winning the THIRD trick in the suit.
Then, when East wins with the Ace of Clubs, he will have no cards in Diamonds with which to give his partner the lead.