BRIDGE MASTERCLASS

North ♠ J ♥ KQ 8 6 ♦ J952 ♣ A K 10 3

Playing Pairs, what would you open on this hand?

It appears that our bridge world has been invaded by a few teachers from outer space, who are determined to pervert the course of natural and common-sense bidding, because a new genre of player has emerged claiming to have been taught to open 1 ♣ on this hand type. More disturbing is the fact that they suggest such methods have something to do with Acol. Only natural bidders who are playing five-card majors in the Standard American/ Goren style might legitimately open 1 ♣ here.

the golden Acol principle before opening is that the sensible rebid should be planned. And here, there would be no sensible rebid after the likely response of 1 ♠ — the hand is unsuitable and too weak for 1Nt, and a reverse bid would be disastrous. Our rule is that on 1-4-4-4 hands you open with the suit below the singleton, except when the shortage is clubs, and then we choose the middle suit (hearts).

the only exception to this is when you consider a suit to be too weak to deem biddable; in such a case, you treat the hand as a two-suiter, i.e., on the above hand, I wouldn’t criticise the choice of 1 ♦ if your red suits were interchanged — but 1 ♥ will never be wrong.