CONTRACT BRIDGE

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LIX, Issue 17950, 30 November 1932, Page 4

CONTRACT BRIDGE

I Hints for Players \ \ (No. 19.) I FORCING BIDS The use of forcing calls and overcalls is of such 'importance in contract calling that a recapitulation of the principles involved in their use may be ■well worth while. The essence of the ap’proach-forcing system lies in commencing the bidding with calls of one in order to give one’s partner an opportunity of showing his strength. By starting the bidding at a low level both the opener and his partner have more chance of dove-tailing their hands and arriving at a final call which best suits .tho combined hands. In the large majority of hands, therefore, the bidding opens with a call of one and it is only with exceptionally strong hands or with freak distributions that this principle should be departed from. With exceptionally strong hands, however, there would he considerable risk in opening the bidding with a call of one. Here your honor strength is so great that the chances are that your partner will have little honor strength. However, in spite of this your great strength practically ensures game provided the most suitable eall for the combined hands 3s eventually arrived at. In these circumstances then it is necessary that there should he some method of indicating to your partnei that you hold such great strength. This is done hv means of a call of “two in a suit.” This is a forcing call, and it puts your partner into the position of having to call at all costs. The one thing he must not do is pass, until a game call in some suit or no trumps is reached. It is no use your partner passing and making the excuse that he was too weak to call. If ho is as weak as all that, then he should call two no trumps. That is known as a minimum response, 'because it does not increase the number of tricks you have contracted to make. The opening bidder Will immediately assume from this response that his partner is weak and will act accordingly. If, however, your partner has some strength game is more or loss a certainty. If he can support your suit he should do .so, remembering to give the full number of raises in your suit which his hand justifies. If he cannot support you and has a biddable suit of his own he should call that suit. It sometimes happens in that your partner may have adequate support for your suit, sav Q x x and a good suit of iiis own. In this 'case 'lie should call his own suit rather than support you. There is no danger in this, as the forcing bid ensures that the bidding will be kept open till a game call is reached and he will have ample opportunity of supporting your suit on a subsequent round. When your partner has opened the bidding with a call of one and you hold a strong hand it. is necessary again that you should have means of notifying him of the fact. The principle‘here is just the same as before. You have, however, the additional assurance that your partner has at least 21 honor tricks. Tn this situation you notify your partner of your .strength •by a jump take out into another suit. This again is a forcing ibid, and puts the obligation on both partners of keeping the bidding open until a game call is reached. If your partner has additional strength in his hand beyond that already shown by his opening call of one he must then show it, either by rebidding his own suit, by supporting yours, by calling another, suit if he holds’ one, or iby calling three no trumps. If, however, he has opened the bidding on the minimum holding he must indicate to you that he has nothing further to show you by making the minimum bid possible in no trumps.

The application of these forcing principles in actual play is by no means difficult, and it is certainly one of the most attractive features of contract bid. Forcing bids are not absolutely fool-proof, hut it is very rarely that they go wrong, and then only on account of some very unusual distribution of the cards.

(To be Continued.)