Lead Direction

 

Finding the right opening lead is a hit-and-miss affair, so we must not miss opportunities in the bidding to point Partner in the right direction.

 

 

30th August, 2006            Board 26      Dealer East       Both Vul

 

 

What are the choices?

  Dbl?              Not good enough for that.

  2NT?            This would show the unbid suits, but a more distributional hand (and usually a weaker one)

                        than the take-out Double.  Not an unreasonable bid, but we’d prefer not to be vulnerable, of

                        course.

  Pass?            Not terrible, either.

  2♦?                Yes, yet another lead-director, and our own choice … true, there is a good chance that we’ll

                        be on lead ourselves against a Spade contract, but that’s not a certainty by any means.  It

                        hardly looks like we can compete for this contract, so we might as well make our one and

                        only bid a lead-director.

 

 

31st October, 2007           Board 13      Dealer North       Both Vul

 

 

North’s sequence shows 22-23, giving N-S a total of 32-33, and on the borderline for 6NT.  North also has three Tens and a nice 5-card suit so we’d say that it’s worth taking a shot at slam, so we’d just bid 6NT directly.

 

We’re sure that you have noticed that we might be missing two Aces.  Anyone for Gerber, just to be sure?  Not us, if we bid 4♣ we’d be afraid that it would give West the opportunity for a lead-directing Double, a bigger risk, we think, than the chance of missing two Aces.

 

 

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