Playing ACOL, strong 2s. How should I have opened this hand?
S: AQTxx
H: AJT
D: K
C: AQTx
20 points, but I clearly can’t open 2NT, and it’s not really good enough to open 2S. Or is it? I downgraded it a bit due to the singleton King of Diamonds and opened 1S. What should I have bid?
That doesn’t seem like a strong two opener to lily-livered me–lots of holes and only 6-7 tricks if the cards are lying to your disadvantage. 1S is the obvious opener, though if partner came back in diamonds we would probably end up in NT. And hope for enough transfer to make it work.
Yeah, 2S, I’m not seeing eight playing tricks there despite the points. If partner gives you a negative, what are you going to do? Leave it in 2NT and you’re daring the gods of bridge to give partner three or four small diamonds and the defence to take the first five tricks, and you have to try to take the rest with the very real possibility that partner’s hand is entryless or all the missing Kings are offside. 3S, and partner’s got no support and LHO is leading Ace and another diamond and forcing the life out of you. You certainly can’t chime in with 3C without giving partner a completely misleading picture of your hand, so 2S essentially leaves you no rebid over 2NT, which is not a good start.
1S and a jump rebid sounds fine, with the possibility of going 1S - 2D - 3NT since partner’s response guarantees you have points to spare and you might as well go straight to the nine-trick game while telling the opponents nothing. If LHO then opens either of the unbid suits you’re being given a trick on the lead. If you actually get spade support for your opening bid then again your singleton Diamond is now a valuable second-round control.
Looks like a 1S opener to me. In Standard American, that would probably be followed by a 3C to show a big hand.
So is there a story behind this? Did your partner pitch a fit at the NABC?
By ACOL, 2S shows at least a 6-card suit or two 5-card suits; it’s far too easy to get into trouble with that bid. There are also really only four playing tricks, by far too few for 2S. 2NT shows points but requires balance that you don’t have.
1S is almost surely the correct bid without additional conventions. With partner having 6+points in response, you surely have game, and they must have AD or at least one K in the other suits to complement your hand. Lead (or opponent preempt) will also help determine the shape of opponent’s distributions to guide your play.
In North America, you are a mile away from a strong 2.
For ACOL, not sure. With that distribution I’m guessing you need something like AQJ(xx) in the black suits rather than AQT.
In duplicate, where creativity pays off (sometimes) I would open 2NT if the black suits were reversed.
I opened 1S and we ended in 4S making 6. Partner had AD and the lead of a heart helped.
What was partner’s hand?
Something along the lines of
S: xxxx
H: Qx
D: AJxx
C: xxx
Whoa! Slam is very sketchy.
You made 6? A good play problem for 4 Spades.
Really nothing controversial about the hand. Sure, it makes 6, but that’s just bridge. You could bid 6, and find your LHO sitting there with all the kings. Some people will possibly stretch a point, bid Blackwood and take a leap of faith bid to slam, but with short points and fairly flat hands, it’s not a high probability slam.
The lead helped. The King of Spades was on my right and trumps split 2-2. The Diamond queen fell on the second round (6-2 split) so the Jack was another winner and I only lost a club at the end.
Right now I am less than impressed with tonight’s partner who thought that 2C was a weak bid. Twice. Grr…
Moving to the Game Room.
I don’t know ACOL, and I haven’t played duplicate in years. When I did, I was whatever title applies to holders of 50ish masterpoints. I played mostly SAYC, with a couple of tweaks depending on my partner. I’d have opened that at 2C to show the big hand, or if my partner opened, I’d give him a jump shift and the option to look for a slam.
“Acol” is not an acronym and should not be all caps. I’m not familiar with SAYC but on a quick browse you may be right that the hand given is right for a SAYC 2C. It is much too weak for either an Acol 2C or a “Two Clubs” 2C, where you’re meant to have five quick tricks and a hand which will make Four of whichever major you can find a fit in, or 23+ points with a No Trump shape (a “Two-and-a-half NT” opener).
As it happens the hands as given would have bid their way easily to a sound Four Spades after an Acol 2C opening (it would go 2C - 2D - 2S - 3S - 4S) but if you swap around partner’s Hearts and Spades then things don’t look so good. (Yes, I know partner would not have the Queen of Spades.)
Wow. I have probably only played around 100 hands of bridge in my life, but even I know that 2C is the strongest opener (absent non-standard conventions; anything at 3-level or higher is a pre-empt, barring ridiculous hands that basically never occur in real life). I must admit that I did learn this the hard way - in one of my first online games I picked up a partner who stated they played weak 2s, so when they opened 2C I responded accordingly, only to be informed “weak 2s” means “except 2C”! However, it was a lesson I only needed to learn once. Twice in the same night is pretty unforgivable.
4NT is stronger still - it means “Partner, bid Five of any suit in which you hold the Ace; Five Clubs if none; 5NT if two; Six Clubs if the Ace of Clubs only” and implies that you can safely stand, or bid over, any response from your partner. For those once-in-a-lifetime hands where you have a cold slam, maybe a Grand, if partner has the right Ace, and can safely bail out into a five-level contract if he has none.
Needless to say, I have only ever heard of this in stories…!
Good point. I was pleased enough with a hand where my partner opened 1S and I had a hand that was enough (or nearly) to open 2S - happy days. I responded 4NT (Blackwood), got a good response, continued with 5NT, and I can’t remember if we finished in 6S or 7S but she made it, despite her look of horror at my first response!
I’ve also never had the chance to open a “Gambling 3NT” which means “Partner, I have seven tricks ready to run in a minor suit” and under some circumstances can mean partner becoming declarer in anything from Four to Seven of your minor with a trump void in his own hand. 