By today’s increasingly feckless standards, I suspect only being vulnerable stopped East opening 3H. Good old Sun Tzu (The Art of War) though – he would have made a good bridge player I suspect.
ON BWTA, when I started playing (Acol in the 1970s, 4 card majors), advice was to open 5-5 in the black suits one club although I suspect today’s hand would have got all bar the die-hards to open 1S with such a suit. Still, there is always the point that you can bid spades without upping the level after a red suit barrage; it certainly wouldn’t work with H & C.
Regards,
Iain
bobbywolffJuly 4th, 2023 at 8:05 pm
Hi Iain,
Methinks the 2 heart opening should be made whether vulnerable or not as more or less, textbook while vulnerable, but also NV, although slightly above value when NV.
Regarding the BWTA, and with such good spades, it seems right to open 1 spade, but rebid 2 spades over a 2 level red suit response by partner, merely because of the strong spade holding and, of course, only a basically minimum opener. At least to me, the club suit being weak, although 5 in length is biddable, but the hand is not strong enough at either vulnerability to rebid 3 clubs. Nothing iron clad, but only just an opinion.
To instead open 1 club allows opponents in the bidding at the one level, an underrated disadvantage, which comes back to haunt the black suit holder in several ways. 1. poor description of one’s best suit, 2, preemptive value, 3. lead direction, in case of winding up on defense, and if eventually declaring. 4. not giving away unnecessary G2 to those unworthy opponents. Simple enough reasons, but over a lifetime of choices, IMO that choice would
be in the top 50% rather than the bottom 50% of possible emphasis.
Again, only my judgment and as always only speculation, not tried and true percentage.
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Hi Bobby,
By today’s increasingly feckless standards, I suspect only being vulnerable stopped East opening 3H. Good old Sun Tzu (The Art of War) though – he would have made a good bridge player I suspect.
ON BWTA, when I started playing (Acol in the 1970s, 4 card majors), advice was to open 5-5 in the black suits one club although I suspect today’s hand would have got all bar the die-hards to open 1S with such a suit. Still, there is always the point that you can bid spades without upping the level after a red suit barrage; it certainly wouldn’t work with H & C.
Regards,
Iain
Hi Iain,
Methinks the 2 heart opening should be made whether vulnerable or not as more or less, textbook while vulnerable, but also NV, although slightly above value when NV.
Regarding the BWTA, and with such good spades, it seems right to open 1 spade, but rebid 2 spades over a 2 level red suit response by partner, merely because of the strong spade holding and, of course, only a basically minimum opener. At least to me, the club suit being weak, although 5 in length is biddable, but the hand is not strong enough at either vulnerability to rebid 3 clubs. Nothing iron clad, but only just an opinion.
To instead open 1 club allows opponents in the bidding at the one level, an underrated disadvantage, which comes back to haunt the black suit holder in several ways. 1. poor description of one’s best suit, 2, preemptive value, 3. lead direction, in case of winding up on defense, and if eventually declaring. 4. not giving away unnecessary G2 to those unworthy opponents. Simple enough reasons, but over a lifetime of choices, IMO that choice would
be in the top 50% rather than the bottom 50% of possible emphasis.
Again, only my judgment and as always only speculation, not tried and true percentage.