Bridge conventions are only of use if you are both playing the same one. It is good to have agreements in slam bidding and a surprisingly large percentage of the field in this week's EBED SIMs missed grand here:
The auction at the table of the Woodberry winners, Mike Bull and John Bernard, was 1D-1S-4C*-4NT-5H-5NT*-6D-7S-All Pass. 4C was a splinter and 4NT RKCB. Mike and John do not show voids in response to RKCB, so 5H was 2 without the queen. 6D showed the king of diamonds, but not the king of hearts. A good method is that 5NT asks for specific kings, and then you bid the one you have or the one you don't have when you have two! It was easy now to bid 7S.
How does one show a void in response to RKCB? Some play that 5NT is two key cards and a void. Others play that it is an odd number of key cards and a void ... One can see wheels coming off now and the apple cart being upset, and indeed only a quarter of the field bid the grand. Both of these metaphors predate bridge and are from the earliest days of transportation.
A better method, when one side has splintered, is that a raise of the splinter is a VIRK, asking partner to include a void in that suit as a key card, but to respond normally with a singleton. Here, South just bids normally as 5C by North would have been the VIRK, and South knows North does not care if the splinter is a void or not.
Our auction went the exactly same as John and Mike's but I leapt to 7S over 5N, on the basis of the solid diamond suit (what else can Andy need to make the grand good?).
ReplyDeleteI think with a slightly better holding in diamonds I'm supposed to leap to 7D, giving Andy the choice of 7S or 7N if he can count 13 top tricks (should this be six solid diamonds?). Cheers, Liz