September 2007 - 39

play bridge
A section designed with the newer player in mind.

Give your partner
a little support
Early in your duplicate life you
find the advantage of having lots of
trumps. The more the merrier. There
are hands where you only have seven
trumps in the partnership, however,
and it still plays better there than in
notrump. I know, for some of you,
every contract plays better when it is
not in notrump!
I am going to share a secret with
you. I don't want it to get out, because lots of other players will start
using it. After you have opened the
bidding and partner responds in a
major suit, you do not need to have
four trumps to raise. It is nice to have
four, but nice is not always possible.
Let's take a look at opener's hand:
8 7 A J 6 K Q 8 6 5 A 4 2.
You open 1 and partner bids
1. You could rebid 1NT (but you
have no spade stopper), 2 (you
have only a five-card suit and balanced hand) or raise to 2 (you have
only three trumps). Of these three
choices, the 2 bid will work best
on balance. Any time partner has five
hearts, your bid is perfect. Even when
he holds only four hearts, the contract
might be fine. The only requirement
to put on the three-card raise is to
have a ruffing value and a reasonably
good holding in your partner's suit.

When you and partner are both weak
in a side suit, the trump contract usually scores much better.
Suppose he has:
9 6 5 10 8 7 3 2 8 7 K Q J.
Whatever rebid you choose is going
to be the final contract. Take a look
at the two hands together - a heart
partscore looks like a winner. In
notrump you are likely to be held to
five winners. Even if the responder
only had four hearts and one more
club, the hand might produce extra
trump tricks to make the 4-3 fit a
higher scoring partscore.
If the responder has a medium
strength hand or better (11 or more
high-card points), he can use a little
gadget over your raise to find out
more about your hand. After the raise,
he bids 2NT to ask what kind of a
hand you have. Your responses are:
3 = minimum (12-13) with
three-card raise
3 = maximum (14-15) with
three-card raise
3 = minimum (12-13) with
four-card raise
3 = maximum (14-15) with
four-card raise
This allows you to stay in the
major when you have an eight-card
fit or consider some other place to

I am going to share a secret with you.
I don't want it to get out ...
Notes from ACBL Accredited Teachers
September 2007

Val Covalciuc
ACBL Accredited Teacher
valerierick@comcast.net

play if the partnership only has seven
trumps. You might still veer into
notrump or even play in partner's
minor. You might choose to play
game with only seven trumps, if they
are reasonably good. You might even
have a hand that is considering slam
if partner has a maximum and four
trumps.
As far as I know, this gadget has
no name, but it does allow the opener
to raise freely with three trumps. Try
it out with your favorite partner and
share all your success stories with
me!
r

Impossible lead
After play was over, the opening
leader said she knew a club lead
would have defeated the contract
- but she couldn't lead one. "You
weren't void in clubs," said partner,
"so why couldn't you lead one?" The
answer: "Our card says we are play‑
ing fourth‑best leads, but I had only
three clubs. I didn't want anyone
calling the director on me."
39
Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of September 2007
