| Adventures of a bridge professional 3: Otijaha |
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An example of what I have found out. In the early days of bridge there were no conventions after a 2NT opening: no Stayman, no transfers, nothing. Culbertson decided 3♠ over partner's 2NT had to be forcing, because weak hands, on which you do not want to go any higher than 3♠, are rare. Unlike hands on which you do want to be in game (or slam) but have to find out whether to play in no trump or in a suit (and which one). Jacoby popularised the transfers bids and suddenly players could bid their five card spade suit both forcing (by bidding on after partner's 'obedient’ 3♠-bid) and nonforcing (by passing 3♠). In short, quite an improvement. But what about the replies after 2NT-3♥ (transfer for spades)? Very strange that hardly any partnerships have agreements about this situation. My invention is (according to Culbertson's principle, so with very weak hands and a spade suit one just has to pass on partner's 2NT) that the 2NT opener shows a spade fit by 'obediently' bidding 3♠ (after that every new suit is a cuebid) and denies a fit with 3NT (after which continued bidding is natural, so 4♦ now shows a diamond suit). Simple but very effective. Almost every Tuesday I play on Stepbridge (Dutch internet bridge club) with HansM as a partner.
1 fit, enquires 3♣: 15-17 HCP After 3♥ and 3♠ the successive bid enquires after the singleton / void:
1 fit, enquires The same applies after 3♣ en 3♦, but now the opening bidder may or may not have a singleton / void. Without a singleton he bids as low as possible in the trump suit. Therefore:
1 fit, enquires After an overcall by the opponents:
1 fit, enquires pass: minimum (would have bid 3♦ without the overcall) An example:
1 fit, enquires 3♠ : 18-19 with a singleton But in bridge often counts: good as the convention may be, often you have to wait a long time before it proves its value. On a Tuesday on Stepbridge the time had come:
1 fit, enquires This board brought in 12 IMP which was just enough for promotion. You can also send an e-mail if you think it fun to play with me on OKbridge. And this week's question is: What does Otijaha stand for other than a bridge convention? |
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In my view a bridge player cannot be a good bridge player without having developed his own bidding system. The reason is that during this development a player starts thinking more profoundly about the game. He considers the pro's and cons of every possibility and in the end he has produced something to be proud of.