The Aces on Bridge: Friday, November 4th, 2016
Take short views, hope for the best, and trust in God.
Sydney Smith
| N | North |
|---|---|
| N-S | ♠ 7 4 ♥ 9 6 2 ♦ K J 10 5 3 ♣ A Q 5 |
| West | East |
|---|---|
| ♠ A 10 8 6 2 ♥ 10 8 5 4 ♦ A 6 ♣ 8 4 |
♠ J 9 3 ♥ A 7 3 ♦ 9 8 7 ♣ 10 9 6 2 |
| South |
|---|
| ♠ K Q 5 ♥ K Q J ♦ Q 4 2 ♣ K J 7 3 |
| South | West | North | East |
|---|---|---|---|
| Pass | Pass | ||
| 1 NT | Pass | 3 NT | All pass |
♠6
The Smith Echo is a defensive signal against no-trump. Either first or third hand can echo at their earliest opportunity on a lead by declarer, to say that they particularly like the suit led. It does not apply if a count signal is required, and it is controversial only because defenders must be careful to signal in good tempo when using it, or they risk conveying unauthorized information.
Here, for example, West leads the spade six against three notrump. South takes East’s jack with the king, then plays on diamonds. West takes the second diamond, while observing East follow with the diamond seven then nine. East cannot now have the spade queen, or he would have echoed in diamonds, to show an unexpected extra honor in the opening lead suit.
West can see there is likely to be no hurry to attack clubs if his partner has the king. But if declarer has the club king and partner the heart ace, the failure to return a heart at this point would give the contract to declarer.
West must therefore return his heart eight now, hoping his partner can win the ace, and revert to spades. Even if East doesn’t have the heart ace, but some heart holding such as the king-queen or king-jack, plus the club king, the contract should still be beatable. Declarer cannot come to nine tricks without developing an extra club winner.
Today, if West returned anything but a heart, declarer would take nine tricks. But the heart return leads to two down.
It would not be wrong to show a good high-card raise in clubs with a cuebid of two hearts. The problem is that if partner fits diamonds, both sides could be making vast numbers of tricks – and how is partner to know that? If you trust your partner to be a sound overcaller, you might jump to three diamonds, a fit jump showing good diamonds and a raise to four clubs or more.
BID WITH THE ACES
| ♠ 7 4 ♥ 9 6 2 ♦ K J 10 5 3 ♣ A Q 5 |
| South | West | North | East |
|---|---|---|---|
| Pass | 1 ♥ | 2 ♣ | Dbl. |
| ? |
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Bridge-related
Hi Bobby,Re BWTA,Does the Vul not come into this as to 2H or 3D?If NS is vul,South should bid 3D and nv maybe 2H(diamond ‘fit’ unknown to N) is enough?There seems to be a lot of bidding on this table..other point being(at pairs) North’s 2C,if EW vul,could be just space…or time wasting bid these days..regards~Patrick.
Hi Patrick,
No doubt, you are either 100% right or close, when you try and differentiate between responses to NV 2 level overcalls from ones which are vulnerable.
Also the personalities of the partnership and their opponents come into play where one bid is right and the opposite action correct when different players are competing, depending who is sitting where and maybe we also need to consider the current mood of all the players involved.
Purists hate this kind of answer since learning good bridge is difficult enough without it being people oriented, which changes a right bid to a wrong one and versa vice.
Furthermore, are you after my job when I retire, for if so, I’ll be very proud to recommend you since you seem to have a very good grasp of what is important and why.
Hi Bobby,Your humour is what it is..coupled with Bridge..it brightens us all daily,year in year out..long may it continue.Very Best Regards~Patrick.