After North’s pass East must consider his/her hand. Technically it fits the requirements of a 2H opening bid, but consider the pros and cons of bidding. You have a very poor suit, the spade Queen may be worthless. You are short of spades so the likelihood of a spade overcall is high. The very name of ‘weak two’ seems to incite bridge opponents to overcall. You give away information to the opponents that they can use if they win the auction. There is no lead direction advantage which could benefit partner if he/she is on lead, so pass may be indicated. Now as South you must make the strongest bid available. North will give a positive response of 3C: This bid doesn’t help except that the response was positive. You know that you are going to play in spades, the question is will it be 4S or 6S. One solution is to bid 5S. which at club level can only mean a slam try; asking North bid 6S with a positive feature that can help a slam.

North has 3 spades and two kings which should be enough to ensure 12 tricks, especially as the clubs have a KQ combination.

¹ 23+ points, game force.

Results

3SS +3; 3SS +4; 4SS +2 (twice); 6SS = (twice)

N-S 1^st H Clohessy & M Wesselo…56.3% 

        2^nd Dianne & David Long……..54.5%

E-W 1^st L Kolesky & G Dempers…..58.0%

        2^nd J Tagg & E Jurgensen…….56.9%