Describe the shape of your hand

E.M. Forster, an English novelist who was nominated for the Nobel prize for literature 16 times but never won, said, “Spoon feeding in the long run teaches us nothing but the shape of the spoon.”

Every bridge hand has a shape — a distribution. One of the key aspects of accurate bidding is describing your hand shape to partner. In today’s auction, for example, what did South’s three-no-trump bid convey?

There is a lot to discuss here with your partner, especially if you use two-over-one game-forcing, as this North-South pair was doing. North’s one-no-trump response was forcing. He was expecting to rebid three spades to show gameinvitational values with three-card support. After South’s three-club jump-rebid, some pairs play that a leap to four spades indicates the game-invitational hand, but this pair prefers to save space on a good hand when slam is possible. (For example, give South 5=1=3=4 distribution.) Here, South bid three no-trump to describe his 5=2=2=4 pattern.

North wondered about a slam because of the double fit, so controlbid four clubs. However, South had too many red-suit losers.

West led a heart. East won with the ace, and South unwisely falsecarded with his queen. Then, East gave his partner a club ruff, leading a suitpreference 10. West ruffed and, getting the message, led another low heart. East won with his heart 10 and delivered a second ruff to defeat the contract.

It’s embarrassing to make a slamtry, then go down in game.