Goren Bridge

In a time when artificial gadgetry seems to dominate most expert auctions, it’s a pleasure to see an auction based purely on bridge logic. North in today’s deal was the late Sydney Lazard, a Hall of Famer, playing with his regular partner, Bart Bramley.

Many non-expert players would open the North hand with a bid of two clubs. It’s a way to “start the party” and inform partner that good times are about to roll. Experts will not open distributional hands with a two-club bid unless the high-card strength is overwhelming. Describing a distributional hand is even more difficult when you start with an artificial bid at the two level.

Lazard might have bid four hearts at his second turn, but he thought he was too strong for that bid after Bramley’s two-level response. Slam chances were significant. The delicate four-diamond bid brought a somewhat timid preference from Bramley, but Bramley couldn’t know that his side had an eight-card fit, much less nine. The four-heart bid gave Lazard confidence that his heart suit was solid, and he tried a four-spade cue bid. Bramley wanted to accept the slam try, but he didn’t know which suit to play in. He jumped to six clubs to emphasize his club strength. Lazard recognized that his king of clubs was golden, so he jumped to the grand slam in hearts.

Bramley was certain that his partner held long, solid hearts, plus a minor suit king, so he converted to seven no-trump and the top spot was reached. A well-bid hand!