A lucky result

A session with Elwood highlighted what I consider to be a problem area for our bidding (and for bidding with all my other partners too, for that matter). What do you do with a big balanced hand as responder?

E-W game, dlr E

           ♠ A K 6 3
           ♥ 10 8 6 4 2
           ♦ 9
           ♣ 6 5 3
♠ J 10 5               ♠ Q 9 4
♥ A Q 5       [ ]      ♥ K 7
♦ Q 5 3                ♦ A K 10 6 4 2
♣ A K J 4              ♣ Q 9
           ♠ 8 7 2
           ♥ J 9 3
           ♦ J 8 7
           ♣ 10 8 7 2


E    S    W    N
1♦   pass 2♣   pass
2♦   pass 2NT  pass
3NT  all pass

The opening lead was a small heart, and I was quickly able to claim all thirteen tricks. That was a very good score, of course, with no slam making, but nobody at the table was happy. Elwood says I have to do more with my (West) hand, and I agree.

Since 2♣ is game forcing, I can aim for 6♦ and show my good diamond support at the three level, and cue bidding should take us safely to 5♦. That's a case of the operation being successful but the patient dying, because it doesn't score nearly as well as 3NT. The problem I see is that we almost certainly will have trouble identifying that we have a spade stopper, although the cue bids will highlight that we don’t have a control for slam. So finding an alternate resting place (say, 4NT) won’t be likely to happen.

Alternatively, I could push for 6NT, say by raising 3NT to 4NT as an invitation. The problem with that is Elwood’s hand is good for his bidding to that point. So we might well finish in a failing slam.

Maybe this hand is just a brute to deal with. But I think there is a real difficulty with very strong, balanced responding hands that don’t have an immediate fit with opener’s minor. We need to be able to identify stoppers, and fits, and also get into cue bidding when necessary. On some sequences we might be able to do all that, but a lot of the time I don’t think we’ll manage it.