One of the most common conventions used in competitive bridge is the "unusual no trump". When the opponents are bidding and you can jump in no trump (most normally at the two level), you are showing a hand that is at least five-five in the minor suits.
There are two types of hands that qualify. If you are not vulnerable, you may have a very weak hand. In that case, whatever high cards you do have should be in the minor suits. Remember, you are forcing your partner to make a choice at the three level. The other type of hand would be one like todays North hand. With six clubs and five diamonds, and with both suits headed by the ace and king, game is possible opposite a hand that has three or four cards in either of those suits with no points at all.
How does your partner know which hand you have? If you make your two no trump bid and then don't bid again (unless forced), you have the weak hand. If you bid again, you should have the strong hand.
After North bid two no trump, East raised his partner's spade bid. South could have passed but with three cards in both minors plus the ace of hearts, he decided to bid four clubs to show a fit. North asked for aces and when South showed one ace North bid the club slam.
West led the ace of spades and continued with a second spade. Trumps were drawn in two rounds and when the diamond finesse worked, North-South scored up +920 for an excellent result.
Congratulations to Dorothy Piovano of Medina and Marge Sobey of Middleburg Heights who were second in Stratum C of the stratified pairs at the Labor Day Regional Bridge Tournament in Pittsburgh on September 2. This result was inadvertantly omitted when the results from this tournament were listed.
Great Game Products of Potomac, MD has released Version 16 of Bridge Baron, The American Contract Bridge League rates Bridge Baron as "The Most Popular Computer Bridge Program" and on five separate occasions this program has won the world computer bridge championship. It is Windows and Mac compatible and includes seven complete bidding systems with over seventy-five optional conventions.
This is an excellent product to use for practice of defense and declarer play. It has an option that lets you play a hand and then have the computer replay the hand to observe the difference. There are "challenge" hands that will help you learn some of the complex plays that don't come up that often, and you can bid and play random deals against the computer.
You can order this product at www.bridgebaron.com for $64.95
plus shipping. You can download a trial version from the same
site.
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Bernstein is
a free-lance writer in Solon.
To reach Harvey Bernstein:
hjb0416@yahoo.com