It pays so often to bid with shape

John Sterling, a 19 th-century Scottish author, said ,“Colours answer feeling in man; shapes answer thought; and motion answers will .” Playing cards usually have two colours; bridge hands have shape( distribution); and th emotions while playing those cards will answer the question of the con tract’ s outcome. In today’ s deal, South opens one heart, West passes, and North raises to two hearts. First, do you agree with that? Second, what should East do now? Third, if South ends in four hearts, what is West’ s killing opening lead? This deal was played 15 times at Bridge Base Online. First, North should bid four hearts. Who knows who can make what? A dozen times, East passed over two hearts, South jumped to game, and it was passed out. West had only one lethal lead: the spa de eight. Surprise, surprise—no one found that. After the diamond queen lead, South won on the board, played a club to his ace, ruffed a club, led a trump to hand, cashed the diamond ace, ruffed the club queen and played asp a de. East had to concede a ruff-and-sluffon which a spade loser evaporated. South lost two spades and one heart. A single South opened one no-trump, an under bid. North transferred into four spa des. In theory, again the only killing lead was the spa de eight; but after the diamond-queen start, declarer understandably lost three spades and one heart. At two tables, East jumped to four no-trump to show at least 5-5 in the minors, a reasonable gamble. West re treated to five clubs, and South doubled. With careful play, West lost two diamonds and two clubs for minus 300 and a great result.