City and Polish Club – Thursday Morning 21st August 2025.
Board 14 last week showed how valuable it can be to get into the auction first.
East and South will both start with a pass and it’s now West’s turn. I would open 1♣ on this hand despite the 10 points – for several reasons:
- It will make things harder for the opponents if it’s their hand (quite possible since partner is already a passed hand).
- It may help our side find a contract.
- I have an easy 1♠ rebid over a 1 level response from partner.
- It’s something I am happy for partner to lead.
- The vulnerability is love-all which is the most favourable time to be competing.
North will either overcall or open 1♥ regardless of West’s choice. But the big difference then comes in the East seat.
If West passed and North opened 1♥ then East has no reason to bid over that. He can’t safely make a takeout double with a singleton club since partner will bid that suit about 90% of the time in response! The auction from North South is likely to therefore be 1♥ 1NT 2♥. Even if West decides to bid on the 2nd round, he’s most likely going to overcall 2♣. North will still bid 2♥ and that will be that. East will be put off competing with a singleton club and a promising defensive trump holding. So their spade fit is unlikely to be found.
But if West had opened 1♣ now things are very different. This time East can double over 1♥. This is basically takeout (although it’s often played as showing exactly 4 spades – see advanced section for more on that). That gives his side the chance to find their spade fit. Once West knows East has some spades he has an easy 2♠ bid and that’s likely to win the contract as it’s pretty unilateral for North to go onto 3♥ all by himself (indeed it could go for a nasty penalty if he does!)
East West finding their spade fit was worth a lot of matchpoints since a number of pairs seem to have sold out to 2♥. At nil vulnerability you want to compete the most and spades allows you to do that and outbid the opponents at the same level.
A 2♥ contract from North tended to go 1 off. East will likely lead his singleton club even if West hadn’t opened the suit. The defence should end up with 6 tricks – 2 spades, 2 trumps and 2 diamonds. They can get those tricks in different ways though – see advanced section for more. It’s of course important for East NOT to bash down ♠A as that will allow declarer to score ♠K that he’s not entitled to. This is another example of it being wrong to lead an unsupported ace against a suit contract! But declarer might end up 2 off if he goes wrong in clubs – can you see what might happen on a club lead? See advanced section for the answer.
What about a spade contract from East West? On the face of it there are only 3 losers – a trump (if West leads ♠Q, North covers and South’s remaining ♠108 are a trick), ♥A and ♣A. But in practice there’s too much work to do – so declarer probably loses a 2nd club. But scoring +140 is still far better than +50 from defending 2♥!
Key points to note
Opening the bidding first has many advantages. It’s particularly valuable in 3rd seat where it’s more likely to be your opponents’ hand.
Finding a spade fit when neither side is vulnerable is very valuable – as it enables you to play the contract far more often.
It’s very seldom right to cash an unsupported ace against a lower level suit contract – be patient and hold your ace to beat the king or queen.
If you think the opponents have led a singleton, try to win your honours sitting OVER that singleton first. Otherwise they could be at risk of being ruffed away when the suit is led through you.
More advanced
After 1♣ (1♥) a common method is to play double as showing exactly 4 spades, and 1♠ as showing at least 5. That can be useful to West in finding out the spade fit (if any) immediately. An alternative approach I have used is for 1♠ to just show 4+ spades (as a response without an intervening bid would have done) and to use double for a hand with fewer than 4 spades but some values and willing to compete. Personally my partner and I didn’t find hands like that came up often enough to warrant it – we found we both preferred to be able to distinguish 4 or 5 spades straight away. But of course there’s no perfect answer and some hands will suit one method better than another.
When defending hearts, East is likely to lead his singleton club. Now when he gets in with ♥K he can put West in with ♦A to obtain a club ruff. If he remains patient and still doesn’t cash ♠A, the defence will come to 2 spades, ♥K, a ruff and ♦AK. Another possible defence is to lead a diamond initially, West puts ♠Q though so the defence cash 2 spades. Then East plays ♦K and another diamond which West ruffs with ♥10. That promotes East’s heart holding into 2 natural trump tricks.
There’s another angle to this too though. On a club lead, declarer in 2♥ is very short of entries to the South hand. It’s tempting to win ♣A in South in order to take a trump finesse. When that loses things could become unpleasant. West can get in with ♦A and now put ♣Q though to enable East to ruff away North’s ♣K. That leaves another club loser. At least it does if the defence are careful. They need to have cashed their 4 tricks in diamonds and spades and then East needs to be on lead to be able to exit a heart and throw declarer back in his own hand. If the defence fail to do that, declarer can exit to them instead. They will have to give access to the South hand and a winning spade (set up after the defence have taken their 2 tricks in the suit) can be used to discard the extra club loser. Had declarer known that ♥K was offside all the time, he could of course just win ♣K in hand and lead hearts from the top. Now East can’t ruff a club effectively – he would be ruffing a loser if West leads one. There are many situations like this where it’s important for declarer to preserve the honour in the right hand so it can’t be ruffed away. Often you can tell from the auction which hand has the shortage and that should guide you which honour to win first.
Julian Foster (many times NSW representative) ♣♦♥♠
