Hand of the Week - Saturday 22 November Tournament Afternoon Session Board 12
- ECB Bridge Club
- Nov 18, 2025
- 2 min read
Updated: Nov 24, 2025
Hi All
I had a struggle between two hands, one on Monday which was a 2 suited hand again, board 28, but I had already discussed one of these last week, so I settled on a hand from our tournament.
I selected this hand to show how different bidding systems can affect the result of the hand. First we will go through the strong NT (15-17) system, N will open 1 NT with balanced hand and 15 hcp, pass by E, S will bid 2D (transfer to Hs), W pass, N 2H, E pass, S will ask for As. You could use 4C (Gerber or CRO) or 4NT (Blackwood or Roman Key card). At this level probably RKC, S is holding two key cards AS & AH, The other key cards are AD, AC and K of trumps and as Hs has been declared as trumps it is KH. You receive a response of 2 key cards, you are missing one key card so 7 is not possible, it does not matter which one is missing, so they bid 6Hs. N is declarer.
Now onto the weak NT. N bids 1D, E pass, S bids 1H, W pass, N bids 1NT with balanced hand and 15hcp, E pass, S has 15 hcp and a void in D so immediately goes to A asking probably at this level RKC. Responses are either 5C 1 or 4 KCs, 5D 0 or 3 KCs, response is 5C one KC(can’t possibly be 4 you are holding 2) because no suit has been declared. S can now ask for Ks (some would use 5D) and gets a responses of 2 KS. Bids 6Hs. S is now declarer.
In the first bidding sequence E is on lead and 80% of the time will lead AD and to his horror it gets trumped, from here 7H is cold. Play AH from hand , two Hs fall , one missing, cross to KH and last Trump falls. Play KQJ of D and throw away losing Ss. Second bidding sequence W is on lead and 90% of the will lead a club which you will win in hand with KC as you need entry to dummy through AC, and then clear trumps and set up your Ds with lead of KD which will lose to AD and you must ruff but now you can only throw away 2Ss on the Ds and you now have a losing S.
So it does depend on the lead, whether you can make your contract or make an over trick.
Colin
