The Cleveland Whist Club (Unit 125 of the American Contract Bridge League) holds an annual "IMP" league that runs from September through April. It is a very popular event and over 50 teams compete. The league is bracketed so that teams compete against other teams of fairly equal skill levels. This makes for highly competitive matches, and for many players, it is the only chance to play extended team matches, which is the type of competition used to determine most major national and world championships.
The above hand was played in a recent Flight 1 match. Harry Stratton of University Heights sat North and Richard Fleischman of Shaker Heights sat South. What is interesting about this hand is the fact that East opened the bidding, West responded, and North-South still were able to bid and make a grand slam.
East's opening bid of one club might be considered light by some players, but it may be the only chance to mention his suit and cannot be faulted. West's response may also be considered light, but his hand is worth five points in diamonds and again, he may never get another chance to speak. North's takeout double is solid. The jump to two hearts by South shows a hand with at least four hearts and eight or more points. West's three diamond bid is strictly interference. North shows first round control of the diamond suit and agreement that hearts will be trumps by cue bidding four diamonds. East doubles to indicate tolerance for the diamond suit. South's redouble is meant to show second round control of the diamond suit. Had North not cue bid diamonds, then the redouble would mean first round control.
At this point, North has enough information to guarantee 13 tricks (given normal distribution), if South has the ace and king of hearts. Five no trump is a conventional bid known as the "Grand Slam Force". In a slam-going auction, where trumps have been agreed upon, a jump to five no trump asks partner to bid the grand slam with two of the top three honors in the trump suit. South had the right cards and bid the grand slam as requested.
The opening lead was the queen of diamonds and for the play to be successful, trumps had to divide no worse than 3-2 and diamonds no worse than 6-3. Declarer would then be able to ruff dummy's two small diamonds for the twelfth and thirteenth tricks. When the distribution proved to be favorable, the grand slam rolled home and was worth 2,210 points. At the other table, the North-South pair was in four hearts making seven. Hills.