A Bidding Mess

Alec McQueen 23rd June 2026

So, here’s an interesting bidding sequence… a tangle of mistakes that got us into trouble in a variety of ways.

Partner in W passed, followed by N. Now, after that here’s how the bidding went, and afterwards we can dissect every fateful blow… 

E: 2NT

S: Pass

W: 2S

E: I lean forward quizzically… 

W: corrects to 3S

S: says: cough cough… hmmmm…. alright, we’ll let that go

N: Pass

E: thinks deeply: alert partner’s bid; 4C

S: pass

W: 5C

N: Pass

E: 5S

South: You can’t do that… 

Quick table discussion ensues, and NS agree to accept the bid. 

So, we’re in 5S by W. We make 10, one off. Not a great score. 

So, what on earth was going on during the bidding??? Let me try to explain (maybe unsuccessfully!). 

1. Pass by partner: totally understandable (but with those values, I may have been tempted to bid a S)
2. My 2NT. OK, it’s mea culpa time… I swear I had 20 HCP… even today sitting down to write this, I would have told you I had 20 HCP. But I didn’t, I had 23. A definite 2C opener, which would have resulted in a very different bidding sequence. Anyway, due to my bad sums, I bid 2NT
3. S passed, as every good 7 point hand should opposite a passed hand (or perhaps not?)
4. Now to the tricky part: partner bids 2S. An insufficient bid. I leaned forward but didn’t want to say anything…  partner recognises her error, and corrects it to 3S. S coughs a bit, considers carefully, and once satisfied that the bid was intended naturally, allows the auction to continue. [I was later told by South that the issue was whether the insufficient 2S bid was natural or artificial. If it had been artificial, then correcting it to 3S might not have been a comparable call, and there could have been restrictions on East’s later bidding.]
5. N passes, I think somewhat intrigued by what is evolving in front of him
6. OK, here’s the nub of the whole sorry mess: I am thinking (regardless of the rules here, which I am no expert in, but this is genuinely what I was thinking): OK, partner originally bid 2S, and then corrected to 3S… what does that mean? If she has spades, then she would have transferred by bidding Hs as we play transfers to majors over both 1NT and 2NT. It’s a transfer to C if I had bid 1NT and she bid 2S. But I bid 2NT… and she was then forced to bid 3S… was her thinking that she wanted to transfer to C? I didn’t know. What I should have done is forget she ever bid 2S, and treat the 3S bid per our agreement (ie no transfers to minors from 2NT). So I should have simply supported her S. But I didn’t. My thinking was WAY too clever, and perhaps a bit illegal. I thought (wrongly) that her intention was to transfer to C, so I alerted her 3S, and then bid 4C. Hmmm… in the full light of day, this was bad, and a wrong decision on a number of fronts. But that is what I did. 
7. S passes I think studying the bidding *very* carefully and wondering if his acceptance of W having S was correct or not. 
8. Partner shrugs and interprets my 4C as I want to be in C. Bids 5C. 
9. N I swear is giggling silently. He knows damn well what kind of a mess I have got myself into… but he passes
10. OK, I am in a mess. Partner has bid 5C, not unreasonably, but I now see my earlier error and I know we need to be in S. So I gamble a bit and bid 5S. 
11. South: “technically, you may not be able to do that… because of the previous insufficient bid”… but he’s being kind, and he lets us do it anyway. 
12. Partner passes, and pass by North. 

So, we’re in 5S by partner, and alas she goes off 1. But that’s not really the point. The point is the horrific bidding mess I got us into: both from a perspective of the laws of the game, but also communications between our partnership. We ended up in a reasonable contract, but only by the gracious largesse of our opponents. 

So, how many errors did we make? My 2NT miscount kicked us off, the 2S insufficient bid continued us on, my alert and 4C response was wrong, and my attempt to repair with 5S was probably illegal. Ho hum, what a litany of error… but what a learning opportunity!

Lessons learned:

• Count your points more carefully before opening 2NT.
• After an irregularity, don’t try to reconstruct what partner “meant”.
• Ignore withdrawn calls and continue from the legal auction.
• When confused, return to partnership agreements rather than inventing new meanings.
• Sometimes one small mistake creates five more.

A Bidding Mess

Alec McQueen 23rd June 2026

So, here’s an interesting bidding sequence… a tangle of mistakes that got us into trouble in a variety of ways. ..........

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