All roads lead to 4♥. There were two routes. Some Doubled with the West cards and some bid 2NT. I’ve included a 2NT auction mainly to highlight that in these auctions after 2NT we are still playing Stayman and Transfers. If East does transfer with 3♦ then it’s a question as to whether you play transfer breaks or not - if you do then West could/should break the transfer with whatever methods you have.

This hand is a lot easier to bid if East doesn’t open 2♦. We had three choices of opening bids for the East hand - Pass, 1♦ and 2♦. Clearly, depending on what partner has any of these could work out best, each bid having its pros and cons This, I think, is an important area for regular partnerships to discuss. This should ensure that there is a consistency of approach and a higher level of acceptance when one of the other approaches would have worked better on any given hand.

The auction I have given starts with a pass - those who passed thought the hand not enough for 1♦ and too good for 2♦ where it might prevent EW bidding a reasonable game - probably in Hearts. Over 1♥ - 2♦ its now decision time for West - her hand has clearly improved and despite only having 14 points - it’s a 5-loser hand with the fit in Diamonds (and possibly Hearts) established. On this basis 2♠ (showing reversing values) seems reasonable - 3♥ confirms the Heart fit and is stronger than jumping to 4♥ .

If anyone cares, I would have opened 2♦.

The EBU have decided that when we teach beginners to play that we open these sorts of hand 1NT rather than 1♥. This is one of the changes they have made in their latest version of the course. So staying on message I’ve opened 1NT - as did the vast majority of the panel. Most now simply bid 3NT with the West cards with a couple bemoaning the lack of a bid to ask for five card majors (over the 1NT opening). Such a bid is often 3♣ (i.e. 1NT - 3♣  asks partner whether she has a five card major or not). If this is in your system this would seem to be a moment to trot it out. If its not and you would open the East hand 1NT you should consider adding 3♣ or an equivalent.

Hands four and eight explore how you develop hands after a 1NT opening. How do you differentiate between hands which are 5-4 in the majors or 5-5 in the majors? 

The auction I have given is consistent with the system card that emerges after the 2-year EBU course. i.e. 5-4 hands go via Stayman (and as you will see from hand 8,  5-5 hands go via transfers).

There are other ways of differentiating between 5-4 and 5-5 major suited hands over 1NT - the key (as always) is that you and partner have discussed it and agreed on a method.

One of my students sent me this hand and asked me how to bid the grand slam. I told her it was very tough and, given the level of intervention from the opponents, virtually impossible. Only two of the panel bid 7♣ - both auctions show a very high level of trust in their partner. Almost everybody bid 3♣ over the 1♠ overcall and that certainly puts things on a better footing as West’s hand looks enormous after the 3♣ bid. 

I decided after 3♣  (which can’t be based mainly on a long solid Club suit as the 3♣  bidder doesn’t have ♣A)  I didn’t have the machinery to find out about all the cards I needed to find out about so bid something I thought must have a reasonable shot.

So this is from a summer league match. I held the West cards and bid 4NT (showing in principle both minors) and we played in a fairly grim 5♦ (very fortunate that someone didn’t double this). Recently, I’ve had two or three very similar hands and I’ve bid 4NT and rather wished I hadn’t. Given that madness is doing the same thing over and over again expecting a different result I was really beginning to question if I knew what I was doing in these sorts of auction so I’m grateful to the support from most of the panel for my action.  

Given that 4NT does show a two-suited hand - usually the minors - if you are not going to do it on this sort if hand when you have eleven cards in your two suits - when are you going to do it?

This is the closest we have come to a unanimous panel since I started this feature. We have established that 4441 hands are tough to bid. The 1NT rebid is not ideal but everyone bid it. Over 1NT, 2♠ typically shows a hand which would have opened a weak two in Spades.