Contract Bridge

1. Two diamonds. It is not necessary or desirable to jump to three clubs to indicate long clubs and a better-than-minimum opening bid. The fact that you bid clubs followed by diamonds identifies two features of your hand. One is that your club length is greater than your diamond length, since with equal length in both suits you would bid diamonds first. The other is that you have better than a minimum opening bid (usually 16 points or more in high cards). This is in accordance with the general rule that bidding a new suit on the two-level that ranks higher than the suit you opened with (commonly called a reverse) shows extra strength.

Many partnerships play that a reverse is forcing for one round. This should be discussed with any regular partner.

2. Partner has at least 13 points in high cards and distribution, and his shape is almost surely either 1-5-4-3 or 0-5-5-3.

He has a game or slam in mind — you can’t tell which — but all you’re expected to do at this stage is to state a preference as to where you’d like to play the contract. Presumably, partner will know what to do after he hears your response to three clubs.

3. Two diamonds. While it is true that you strongly prefer spades to diamonds, the fact remains that the better trump suit might prove to be diamonds. Thus, if partner held: ♠ 7 ♥ AK5 ♦ Q J106 ♣ K9874, you’d have an excellent chance to make six diamonds but would probably make only four or five spades.

The goal in bidding is to try to reach the best contract for the combined hands. While attempting to reach it, you should try to describe your hand as accurately as possible. Here you clearly prefer spades to diamonds, but even so you should allow for the possibility that partner might have much better support for diamonds than for spades. Of course, you plan to rebid spades at your next turn if partner gives you the opportunity.