Contract Bridge

What would you bid as dealer with each of the following five hands?

1. ♠ K8632 ♥ AKQ72 ♦♣ 7 Q4 2. ♠ K94 ♥ AJ3 ♦ AQ85 ♣ KQ7 3. ♠ KQ6 ♥ 97 ♦ 87632 ♣ AKJ 4. ♠ AQJ9874 ♥ 10 ♦♣ 7 KQ85 5. ♠ K83 ♥ AJ4 ♦ 53 ♣ AKJ92 ***

1. One spade. Even though your hearts are much stronger than your spades, it is better to follow the general rule of opening with the higher- ranking of two five- card suits, planning to bid the lower- ranking suit at your next two turns, if necessary. If you were to start with one heart and later bid your spades, your partner would naturally assume that you had only four spades and would not raise you with threecard support. As a result, you might never locate the best partscore, game or slam contract, which could be in spades.

2. One diamond. Though you obviously have a notrump type of hand, the correct opening bid is one diamond. Hands containing 19 high- card points do not fall into the opening notrump category — they are too strong for one notrump and not strong enough for two notrump. Such hands are best described by opening with one of a suit and then jumping to two notrump over partner’s expected response of one heart or one spade.

3. One diamond. Virtually all hands containing 13 high- card points are mandatory opening bids. This rule overrides one’s natural reluctance to open with a suit headed by an eight. Furthermore, it is far better to bid one diamond — a suit in which you have length — than one club, a suit in which you have strength.

4. Four spades. This gives you several possibilities for a good result. First, you have a reasonable chance of making four spades, even if partner has only moderate values. Second, there’s a good chance of buying the contract at four spades undoubled, even if the opponents have most of the missing high cards. Third, if the opponents elect to compete over four spades, they might miss their best spot because they have to start searching for it at the fivelevel.

5. One notrump. This tells partner that you have 15 to 17 points, a balanced distribution (not more than one doubleton) and stoppers in at least three suits — exactly what you have. If you were to open with one club instead, you would have an impossible rebid if partner bid any suit on the one- level. If he bid one heart, for example, you could not bid two hearts (which would indicate 13 to 15 points), three hearts (which would promise four- card support), one notrump (13-14 points) or two notrump (18-19 points). The opening notrump bid spares you this headache.