Diamonds are (often) a Girl's Best Friend

	A 8
	K 9 6 4
	J 10 8 7 5 4 3
	------
K 10 7 5 2		Q
Q 10 5 3		J 8 7 2
9		Q 6 2
10 5 3		J 9 8 6 2
	J 9 6 4 3
	A
	A K
	A K Q 7 4	Opening lead: various

South	West	North	East
1	Pass	1 NT	Pass
3	Pass	4	Pass
4 NT	Pass	5	Pass
5	All	pass

South	West	North	East
1	Pass	1 NT	Pass
2	Pass	2	Pass
4 NT	Pass	5	Pass
6	All	pass

South	West	North	East
2	Pass	2 !	Pass
2	Pass	3 !	Pass
4	Pass	5	Pass
6	All	pass

South	West	North	East
2	Pass	2 !	Pass
3	Pass	4	Pass
5	Pass	5	Pass
6	All	pass

I have felt more comfortable discussing the play of hands, where I can indicate the play that would work, and how declarer or a defender should have recognized it, rather than the bidding, which is far more subjective and where I recognize the viability of a variety of bidding styles. But hands like the above prompt me to take up the bidding.

First, let me give a vignette from the past that will give my position on bidding. On a friendly Saturday afternoon game, competing against one team for small stakes, our counterparts seated across the room, my partner and I reached 6 diamonds on a 28-hcp hand that was cold for 7 no. It was just one of those magical hands where she had 6-5 in the red suits and I had all the fillers and the black aces for 10 hcp's in each red suit and 4 in each black. I felt comfortable with the result. At least we got to little slam, and you're not going to get 'em all right. Furthermore, our counterparts wound up in the same contract, so if we missed a chance to pick up on them, we didn't lose either.

Now in the post-mortem, my partner asked the local expert how to reach 7 no on the hand. And he told her! . . . while I'm thinking, "Hey, man, once you know it makes 7 no, naturally any sequence you devise is bound to be infallible." Nor did he bring in any interference by the opponents which we had (I recall only a 5 club bid on my left, inhibiting my partner from Blackwood). But here's the corker: He was half of the other pair that settled in 6 diamonds! I guess the presumption was that if he missed the same grand slam we did, it must have been his partner's fault.

So I approach the above hand with due humility and the recognition that they're all easier to bid when you can see both hands. Still, there was a 7-card diamond suit in one hand, and a 9-card fit that went begging with some pairs in favor of that meagre, moth-eaten spade suit. And I do have a page advising one not to sneer at the minors, so I'm going to have a go at it.

First I would say that a 7-card suit should be bid twice if you conveniently can and the partnership seems to have the high-card count to warrant continued bidding. Even a jack-high suit. You need so little from your partner to make that a viable trump suit, your best on the hand. If your partner doesn't indicate any liking for the second mention, then it'd probably be wise to settle for his spade suit with your doubleton ace. But not before.

The first three bidding sequences above are from the pairs that got into the most trouble. In the first, there isn't even a mention of the diamond suit! In the second, the only reference to diamonds is clearly a one-ace response to a Blackwood bid, so diamonds weren't being bid as a suit. And in the third, the alerted two diamond bid may be a show of weakness without reference to the diamonds, though North is a little strong for that bid (and the alert is not needed), but the alert and North's strength make me suspect the pair had some other meaning attached to it.

In any event, they all had plenty of room to mention that long diamond suit a couple of times. An ace doubleton is plenty of support for a partner who has a near self-supporting suit, of course. But until you're assured of that, you want to bid that long seven-card suit which becomes a powerful suit when your partner has some support. And this is particularly so when you've got all the bidding space you need, without a hint of interference from the opponents!

Two clubs, two diamonds (alerted), two spades, 3 spades (alerted)? He couldn't bid 3 diamonds? Further, there seems to be a misconception on one partner's part or the other. The alert suggests that North was bidding controls. If so, the opening bidder should certainly want to try his second suit rather than rebid that meagre suit, and if not, the ace-doubleton is certainly not sufficient support to show a fit when there's a 7-card suit staring one in the face. They seem to have gotten too tricky for their own good.

In the first bidding sequence above the responder seems to have been a little too quick to show support with a rather skimpy ace-doubleton when there was certainly room to say 3 diamonds and then over his partner's next bid, 4 diamonds. And in the third it was the same thing, even if only a very modest 2 spade preference bid over partner's second suit. Too soon to show spade support, even preference when you've got a hardly costly 2 diamond bid at your disposal. If your partner has absolutely no tolerance for diamonds, he can rebid one of his suits and then you might settle for spades -- or rebid diamonds, depending on how high you are. But certainly a 2-diamond bid there couldn't be either misleading or costly, the two dangers a responsder must be on guard against. Nor does the drive to slam with a jack-high suit opposite a mere preference bid seem warranted, even if I'd put the primary blame on the diamond-holder who couldn't bid that sit at the two level. And so you get into trouble.

I'm not too keen on the 2 club opening bid, even though the last sequence where the best contract was reached began with that bid. Reverse the black suits and I might be tempted and certainly wouldn't critique anyone who then opened 2 clubs. But when you open with a game force and your first rebid is a major suit, a partner can be forgiven for supposing you have a far, far stronger suit than that one. Looking at the ace, I would expect at least K Q in my partner's holding and probably six cards or better. But I'd still bid diamonds.

As for the last sequence given, they make it look easy. The two-spade response (alerted) to two clubs was doubleless a control-showing bid (three controls, two for an ace, one for a king) at which the opener bid his moth-eaten major suit -- and was lucky in his choice of partner. Four diamonds (where some couldn't bid two) over 3 spades, declarer's first chance to show his real suit. And then over 5 clubs, instead of submitting to a mere preference, she boldly rebid that jack-high suit and bingo. If her partner couldn't stand diamonds, he can rebid his spade and North would probably have been content to let it lay there, or might even have gone to slam. But South didn't have a rebiddable spade suit and wasn't unhappy with diamonds, and so they found their slam.