[Cyberyeti]

Zelandakh, on 2013-August-06, 01:53, said:

Does your regular partner read these forums? If not, I would be interested if you gave them this 7-4 hand blind whether they chose to treat it as "both minors" or "one-suited with clubs". If they choose the latter then finding the 3rd round diamond "control" becomes interesting.

No he doesn't, but we have ways of showing that it's lots-4 if partner doesn't immediately show 4 diamonds and 1N-3♣ (our good hand with clubs) specifically denies another 4 card suit.

[fromageGB]

billw55, on 2013-August-05, 09:45, said:

Ah ok, understand.
Will partner also do this with 5 diamonds?

Cyberyeti, on 2013-August-05, 11:39, said:

No, he needs to be pretty sure you have 10 between the 2 hands, so you can miss grand on 5-5 fit.

Bill, if you as teller know that there is a 10 card fit, and asker doesn't, you reply as if you have the queen because with 10 cards the queen drops on a 2-1 break, and in some of the 3-0 breaks you can finesse the second round. With only a 9 card fit there is a much bigger chance of losing a trick.

[mikeh]

I love the absolute certainty that so many posters seem to feel about their own methods.

As an example, we have players asserting that over opener's 2♦ rebid (a call with which I agree...we should never conceal a 6 card suit if possible, and there is lots of time to bid notrump later), an immediate keycard promises 4 card support, so opener can show the non-existent Queen.

I am not saying that this is unplayable. Playing my preferred methods, it makes perfect sense, but this is because I use 2♦ as a catch-all bid by opener, and I don't show any extra length at all. When opener could bid that way with 4 diamonds, and responder takes control by keycarding, it is probably fairly safe to play this method.

However, I don't see it at all in standard methods, wherein the 2♦ bid promises at least 5 diamonds. Give responder x Ax Axx AKQJxxx and the response to keycard is all he needs to count tricks. Partner shows KQxxxx but only holds Kxxxxx and we will end up in a grand needing 2-2 diamonds, which is not a good spot.

Then we have a player saying that 2♦ usually delivers a 6 card suit.

These approaches, which all make bidding grand trivial, are non-standard yet are being posted in the I/A forum by players who write as if their treatments are normal.

In reality, I think this hand is more complex than these players are willing to admit.

Assuming that 2♦ shows 5 or more, then responder might well keycard, expecting partner to usually hold the Q, and then he has to make a guess.

If partner holds only 5 diamonds, the suit might behave and he might hold 6 in which case we are strong favourites. I wouldn't bid grand knowing that we need a 2-3 break (or a restricted choice should he be 9xxxx!) but I might if I knew it was at worst on a 2-2 break. He'd need to be 5332, and not willing or able to rebid 2N, and surely most 5332 hands with no diamond card above the J would be able to bid 2N. So I might well take the gamble.

Responder might anticipate this problem and set trump. I wouldn't splinter because I want to control the auction. I would bid 3♦. Now partner bids 3N to slow things down. I bid 4♦ to force a cuebid, and while I am maybe biased, I think this sequence definitely shows the 4th trump. Over a 4♠ cue, my 4N would (not for me, but for most) be keycard and now, due to partner having raised diamonds twice and shown very strong slam interest, I would own to the diamond Q.

That makes 7N a reasonable gamble. It is almost always cold.

[monikrazy]

I agree with 2♦ rebid by opener. Even though this does not always promise 6, its very important responder knows that we did not open a 3 or 4 card suit.

Responder can then set trump with 3d (forcing), we can cue our spade control, and responder should have no trouble getting us to slam from there . NT should be safest as we have risk of ruff in both non-trump minor.

As to the problem of how can responder check whether opener has 5 or 6 diamonds (and thus how large of a danger the outstanding Q presents) - what would a jump to 5c or 6c by responder after 3d promise? Could either of those bids help find the grand.