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Opener's Reverse
When Opener reverses he shows a good hand, but, unlike the Jump Shift, the Reverse is not normally played as forcing to game. The following examples address the issue of how to stop short of game and how to continue the force.
7th July, 2010 E-W Vul
North’s two possible plans with that distributional hand were: - Open 1♠, planning to treat it as a 5-5 hand. - Open 1♥, planning to rebid Spades (twice if necessary), treating the hand as a 5-6 reverse. It’s generally preferable (but not always possible) to open our longest suit first, and we’d open this 1♥, even though we only have 13 HCP. More to the point, the hand has the playing strength of a reverse, having only four losers (two Hearts and two Clubs), according to the Losing Trick Count. So, as four losers is the generally accepted benchmark for a reverse, we open 1♥, followed by 4♥ when South raises.
1st June, 2011 None Vul
What is your opening bid? Even though you have a three-loser hand, you would not want to open 2♣, those sequences tend to get crowded when the 2♣ opener has a minor-oriented hand (even more so if it’s a minor two-suiter). If you do not open 2♣, then with that 6-6 hand the normal thing to do is to open the higher-ranking suit. But look what will now happen. North will bid 1♠ and East will throw a wrench in the works with a 2♥ overcall. Now you don’t have a good way to show your Clubs! 3♣ is non-forcing (though in the circumstances it is unlikely to get passed out), 4♣ might be interpreted as a Splinter, 5♣ pretty much gives up on slam (or even worse, you may be playing this as Exclusion!), and 6♣ is altogether too ambitious. Added to that, by bidding Diamonds first and then Clubs, you run the risk of being taken back to Diamonds on some hands where Clubs will play better (for example, if North is 2-2).
It would surely be better to open the hand 1♣! The plan is to reverse into Diamonds (if the auction allows) and later bid some large number of Clubs. The auction will start: West North East South 1♣! Pass 1♠ 2♥ 3♦
Isn’t that better? South has shown better Clubs than Diamonds (though in theory they are really supposed to be longer), and has also shown a good hand (that 3♦ bid is forcing). Next time around she will bid 5♣ showing a self-sufficient suit.
7th September, 2011 Both Vul
North has reversed, showing a good hand. What are your methods here? Let’s suppose that you play the following: - Fourth suit at the two-level (if available) is an artificial weakness bid. On this auction that bid is available, but clearly not appropriate for the hand in question. - Rebid of 2♠: Shows at least five Spades and is ambiguous about strength. - 2NT: A weakness bid unless the aforementioned 4th suit bid is available, in which case it is a non-committal hand which is not sure where it’s going. - 3♣ or 3♦: Natural and game-forcing. - 3NT: A hand with enough for game and a clear preference for No Trump. That implies lack of support for Partner’s minors, and a good Heart holding.
2nd November, 2011 None Vul
North has reversed, showing a good hand, but one which is not necessarily game forcing. What are your methods here? Here is one commonly used style: - Fourth Suit at the Two-Level: It’s not available here, but when it is (as in 1♣ 1♠, 2♦ 2♥) it can be used to show weakness and allow the partnership to stop short of game). - Rebid of 2♠: This shows at least a fifth Spade, ambiguous in terms of strength. - Raise of one of Opener’s Suits: Natural and game-forcing. - 2NT: A weakness bid, allowing the partnership to stop short of game. But Opener cannot pass 2NT, Responder may just have a very weak hand with nothing in the unbid suit, and a desire to play at the three-level in one of Opener’s suits. - 3NT: Shows a strong preference for No Trump, so implies no support for Opener’s suits and a good holding in the unbid suit.
Using those methods we’d say that South was close between bidding 2NT (weak, artificial), and 3NT (natural, enough for game). Our choice would be 3NT (assuming that Partner’s reverses are reliable), though we would be nervous about the Spade suit.
3rd February, 2010 None Vul
What would you open with the West hand? Two schools of thought: - Pretend the hand is 5-5 by opening 1♥, planning to rebid Diamonds - Pretend the hand is reverse strength by opening 1♦, planning to rebid Hearts (twice if the auction permits) Actually, pretending that the hand is worth a reverse is not much of a stretch at all. True, it’s only 12 HCP, but they are all working splendidly. Using the Losing Trick Count, the hand has only 4 losers, and that is very much in the reverse range. Consider this hand: ♠ A3, ♥ AQ87, ♦ KQJT7, ♣ K9 This one is 19 HCP, and is a reverse in anyone’s book. It also has 4 losers (one in each suit), so offensively it is similar in strength to West’s actual 12-count. But, of course, the second hand has considerably more defense.
Anyway, our own preference here is to open 1♦ and reverse into Hearts, but going the other way and opening 1♥ is not at all unreasonable.
4th February, 2009 Both Vul
What would be your choice of opening bid with the North hand? With the Clubs being stronger and longer than the Hearts it may seem a trifle odd to open 1♥. But the danger with opening 1♣ is that Partner (or one of the opponents) will bid 1♠. Now, is the hand really good enough to reverse with 2♥? It’s way short in terms of HCP, but it does have good playing strength and only 5 losers. Others may have stronger opinions on this, but speaking for ourselves, we could go either way.
4th June, 2008 Board 3 None Vul
Because a reverse of 2♦ shows a strong hand there is no need for 3♦ also to show strength. So, a common treatment is for the jump reverse to be a splinter. Most splinter bids are forcing to game by necessity, for example, if the auction starts 1♥ 4♣, then it’s too late to play in a part-score. But here there is still room to play in 3♥, so the common way to play the jump reverse is for it to show around 14 HCP’s or more (with no upper limit).
August 1st, 2007 Board 29 Both Vul
3♣ here would show a 6-card suit and some extras, but let’s eliminate that as a possibility, this hand is at least an Ace too strong for such a bid, we need to make a forcing bid. We cannot bid 4♠ here, that would require 4-card support. Nor can we bid 3NT with that singleton in one of the unbid suits. By a process of elimination we are left with a reverse into our 3-card Heart suit, and that would be our choice.
Isn’t it rather dangerous to lie about our major suit holding in that way? Not really, at least not in this case. If Partner takes our 2♥ bid seriously and raises to 3♥ or 4♥, then we can be sure that he has 4-card Heart support. Therefore, because he responded 1♠ initially, we can be sure that he has 5 in that suit, and can revert to Spades if Partner raises Hearts.
14th November, 2007 Board 26 Both Vul
Here’s a recurring problem. We have a 6-card minor and a 5-card Heart suit with opening values. Do we open the minor suit or do we open 1♥? Here’s one approach to the problem: - If the hand is strong, there is no problem, we can open 1♣ and then, if Partner bids 1♠, we can afford a reverse to 2♥, showing a good hand with longer Clubs than Hearts. The actual 10-count is obviously not strong enough for a reverse, but we wouldn’t need much more to make it so. Adding the A♥ would be enough, and maybe even just the K♥ would be sufficient, when the shape is 5-6 we can afford to lower our HCP requirements somewhat. - If the hand is not good enough for a reverse, and if the long suits are similar in strength or the Hearts are stronger, then we would tend to open 1♥, planning to bid the hand as if we were 5-5. - The most problematic case is the one that we actually have here, where the hand is not good enough for a reverse and where the Clubs are substantially stronger. Now, it seems odd to open that moderate Heart suit when we have such a splendid and longer Club suit. On the other hand, if we open 1♣ and Partner bids 1♠, we’ll be obliged to rebid 2♣, losing any potential 5-3 Heart fit, and even (if Partner cannot bid again) the occasional 5-4 Heart fit. Our own choice would be to open 1♣ with this hand, but it’s only fair to point out that on some hands a 1♥ opening will work better.
8th August, 2007 Board 6 E-W Vul
South’s hand is too good for a rebid of 3♦, so we’ll have to find another bid, one which will be sure to get us to game. 3NT is our most likely destination but it would be somewhat rash to bid it directly with a worthless doubleton in an unbid suit. So, we will have to fudge our rebid, either with a fake jump shift to 3♣, or with a fake reverse of 2♥.
Conventional wisdom is that it’s a lot safer to lie about a minor suit than it is to lie about a major suit. Nonetheless, we would reverse to 2♥ here, it’s more economical that 3♣. If Partner raises to 3♥ (she is not supposed to raise to 4♥, just in case our suit is not real), we will know that she has 5 Spades, so can bid 3♠, offering Partner a choice between 3NT and 4♠.
13th September, 2006 Board 29 Both Vul
What are your agreements after Opener reverses? First, we suggest that you play the bid as forcing and that it further promises another bid, but that is not game-forcing the way that Opener’s jump shift would be. Second, Responder needs a way of showing weakness and allowing the auction to stop short of game, and one simple way to do this is for 2NT to be the weakness bid, the only bid which allows the auction to stop short of game. Another option which has become quite common is that the 4th suit at the 2-level is a weakness bid, as in 1♣ 1♠, 2♦ 2♥ … and that, if there is no such 4th suit bid available we use 2NT as the weakness bid, as in 1♣ 1♠, 2♥ 2NT.
Other bids are game-forcing, so on the actual hand we would simply bid 3♣, which is
game-forcing in the absence of a weakness bid of 2♠. 8th November, 2006 Board 21 N-S Vul
Before you answer this one, let’s impose these methods on you for this Reverse auction: - 2♠ (the 4th suit) is artificial and shows a bad hand - 2♥ shows 5 Hearts but is ambiguous in terms of strength - All other bids are game-forcing - 3♥ shows a good suit, and enough for game, but not necessarily a big hand
If that is the framework then we’d expect a lot of votes for 3♥, showing a good suit. Was that your choice? Well, it’s not ours, though we may be a voice in the wilderness on this one. Our thoughts are this: - If we have a 6-2 fit in our (Heart) suit, we can no doubt find it by rebidding Hearts. - If we belong in a 6-1 Heart fit, then the success of this fit will depend upon the quality of the suit. - The 6-1 fit will be more attractive if we don’t have a slow loser … we don’t mind losing the Ace or King, it’s the slow loser that is disadvantageous (when compared with alternative contracts) - So, if we are to show a good suit, it needs sufficient interior strength to avoid that slow loser opposite a singleton.
South’s Heart holding is good, but is it good enough for a jump rebid? We don’t think so, it doesn’t pass the “Singleton Test”. Opposite a small singleton, this suit will play for one loser just 36% of the time. Suppose that we upgrade the suit to KQJ9xx. Now we are getting closer, opposite a small singleton our chances of just one loser is up to 52%, and we would say that this is a 3♥ rebid, but only just. Improve the suit further to KQJTxx, and we are up to a whopping 81% and a no-brainer 3♥ bid.
The bottom line here is that, on the actual hand, we would bid 2♥ not 3♥. That suit is just not good enough for a 3♥ bid, in our opinion.
1st August, 2007 Board 29 None Vul
An Opener’s Reverse shows a good hand, but is not forcing to game. After the reverse, the most commonly used weakness-showing options for Responder are: - Bid the 4th suit at the two level, if available, as in 1♣ 1♠, 2♦ 2♥. Not an option in the actual auction. - Bid 2NT to show a weak hand. - Rebid 2♠ as a “neutral” bid. 2♠ would be ambiguous, showing a 5th Spade and any strength, could be weak or strong.
Under this schema, North could reasonably bid 2♠ or 2NT. Our own preference would be 2NT, not feeling the need to rebid that mangy Spade suit, and warning Partner immediately that our hand is weak.
29th November, 2006 Board 11 None Vul
How do you and your Partner stop short of game after Opener reverses? Here is one increasingly popular method: - If the 4th suit is available at the two-level (as it is in the featured auction), then this is an artificial weakness bid, and the only way to stop short of game. - If the 4th suit is not available at the two-level (as in 1♣ 1♠, 2♥), then 2NT is the weakness bid and the auction may stop short of game (indeed, 2NT may be passed, unlike the aforementioned 4th suit bid) - A rebid of Responder’s major (2♠ here) is “neutral”, could be good or bad, and forcing for just one round - All other sequences are game-forcing
What does this mean here? Well, the 4th suit is available, so 2NT is not passable. That would be our choice, it seems like the most descriptive bid, we wouldn’t waste our time rebidding that poor Spade suit.
2nd April, 2008 Board 28 N-S Vul
West’s 2♠ showed reverse values but is not normally played as forcing to game. If that is the case then does your partnership have any clear-cut agreement on how to stay short of game? One effective treatment is for 2NT to be a type of Lebensohl bid, and, as such, for it to be the only way to stop short of game. After 2NT Opener will usually bid 3♣, in case Responder has a weak hand with a long minor.
Of course, on the actual hand, East is going to game, so he has an easy 3♦ call, showing his suit and initiating a game-forcing auction. Suppose now that, after 3♦, East bids 3♥. Now what? 3NT is tempting, but there is the danger that Opener is short in Clubs, so, that plus the ruffing value in Spades would persuade us to bid 4♥.
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