Some helpful hints for members
Pro am match Wednesday 24 February
Eleanor asked for a few comments about hands played on Wednesday. Hopefully it will provide you with a little insight.
When club members ask about bids I have made they often ask “how many points did you have”, its all Milton work’s fault, he invented the system ,
people are obsessed by points.
“I had to double I had 15 points” but if your points are red ( hearts and diamonds)
and the contract is black ( clubs and spades ) you may not make any tricks at all.
Shape is very important
Here is an example from our history , you can look up the hand in our fabulous new scoring system
Tuesday 16 February Hand 7
I held
S j9652
H
D KT8654
C A4
The bidding 1h pass (me) 4h pass
Perhaps I should have made a 2 suited overcall but I forgot!
So I bid 4s
This was doubled
Partner’s hand was
S KQT7
H J943
D j72
C 95
Four hearts makes 11 tricks , 4s makes nearly makes 10 tricks so you get a better score
Between you and you partner you have 14 points but fabulous shape.
For homework find out about the law of total tricks.
Here are two hands from our match on Wednesday
You can see the hand by clicking on the web address
https://tinyurl.com/y8gpgr8g hand8 match 2
West has 18 points but a very powerful hand with only 1 club
He opens 1 diamond
Partner has a five count but very nice major holdings with fabulous spades
The chances are that west will have major suit cards, he hasn’t opened 1nt and the worst that
can happen is a 2d bid so it is worth a punt
1 spade
This gets partner very excited
4 clubs (a splinter agreeing spades with a singleton club)
4s by east ( I have no more for you)
(and indeed a regulation game bid and made)
(In the other room the bidding had stopped at 1d East worried about the singleton diamond))
BUT west goes into a trance and emerges with 6s
( help!)
See if you can work out how to play it after KC lead and spade switch. It is stone cold
Point total 24
https://tinyurl.com/y94elpvc hand 4 match 2
Here is a good example of a useful convention for minor suits.
A minor suit game is eleven tricks so you nearly always try to get to 3nt
Here east with 15 points and 6 diamonds open s 1d (those playing strong no trump might open a sneaky 1nt)
In the other room west bid 3d with 11 points and east declined to push on. In fact with best defence only 10 tricks can be made.
There is no easy way to find out if you have the other suits stopped, so at teams you just shut you eyes and bid 3nt.
However if you play inverted minors the bidding goes( 2 of minor strong , 3 is preemptive)
1d 2d
3c ( I have a club stop) 3h ( a heart stop)
And East with q5 of spades hopes partner has 3 to the jack (He Has)
And bids 3nt
Ten tricks on top
I hope you find these observations helpful
Peter Lane
|