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Hi Andrew, If you re-watch the video you might hear me say why I was avoiding a diamond lead, you might have missed it! It is because the declarer has a feature in diamonds (we know that from the bidding) so leading away from the KD is risky and will only work if you find your partner with a diamond honour which is quite unlikely on their auction. Dom

@@learnmodernbridge101 whoops, sorry!

Great to hear it, glad it was helpful! Dom

Not my choice of bid, I agree! Even though I do like bidding as much as possible haha. Dom

Wholeheartedly agree with your comments. I don't think this partnership were playing Lebensohl so it was more of a lucky punt to 3NT! Dom

Haha fair comment. I think I meant it is unfortunate that they can no longer bid - I like bidding! Dom

There are ups and downs to playing ACOL, I agree, however, responding at the 2 level with an 8-loser hand is completely normal and safe. Make it a 9-loser and now a 2 level response is a stretch. Hope this helps, Dom

Yes, it's always ACOL, unless otherwise stated.

Thanks Andrew. Glad to hear you are enjoying the videos :) Dom

Hi Eric, Thanks for your comment. Interestingly, I think that West would have probably bid the same 2S bid as a weak jump overcall, and unless N-S were playing 5 card majors, I dont think North has a clear bid. So the end contract would probably be the same! Cheers, Dom

Hi Jim, Thanks for your comment. A double would not show a spade fit and instead would show the other unbid major, in this case hearts. This would be called a 'negative double' and would not represent our stong spade fitting hand here. Cheers, Dom

Glad you liked it Allan! Dom

Hiya, It is often called the '2NT enquiry' or simply a '2NT ask'. Hope this helps, Dom

Yes, agreed - a transfer to hearts here would have located the huge heart fit. Having said that, West should not have bid 1NT with a singleton spade, but it appears to have worked in this case, as long as East transfers to find the heart fit of course! Dom

Yes, good point Baz! Lazy of me to cash the AKQ of spades when a finesse is a better chance as you say. Cheers, Dom

Hi Toto, Sure thing, no problem. Exclusion RKCB is used when you have a known trump fit, a slam interest and you hold a void in a side suit. If you bid a traditional RKCB 4NT to ask for key cards, this is inefficient because of your void. When your partner answers with their quantity of key cards, the answer isn't that useful because you don't know if one of their key cards is in your void suit, which is not needed. Exclusion RKCB looks to solve this problem by using a different enquiry about key cards but excluding any key cards in the bid suit. To do this bid, you need to leap to 5 of a new suit, out of the blue. It needs to be clearly an exclusion RKCB bid, so it needs to be a surprise, if you see what I mean. The answers to this 5 level bid are then as normal RKCB - 1 step would be 0 or 3 key cards, 2 steps is 1 or 4 key cards, 3 steps is 2 without the Q and 3 steps would be 2 key cards with the Q. Very importantly though, when responding to Exclusion RKCB, the responder must NOT include the Ace of the void suit. Exclusion key card relies on this feature, not counting the Ace in the void suit means that the responder answers with their quantity of the key cards that 'matter'. An example of this 'in action', would be something like: 1H - 3H 5C - 5S 7H - P The 5C bid is exclusion key card, asking for key cards but not including the Ace of clubs. The response of 5S is 3 steps up from 5C, so it shows 2 key cards without the Q of trumps. And to answer your question about if it is usable after a NT bid, the answer is yes, but you'd need to have a clearly agreed trump suit first. Something like: 1NT - 2H* 2S - 5D This 5D would agree spades (by force) and ask for key cards excluding the Ace of diamonds. Hope this helps, Dom

Hiya, A positive response will almost always take up more bidding space than using an automatic 2D* reply. This is because even if the responder bids something rather innocent looking like 2S, the opener can now not bid hearts at the 2 level, so it would then need to be 3H and finding a fit before bypassing 3NT becomes a lot, lot harder. Something like: 2C* - 2S 3H - ? With: AQ10xx xx Jxx Qxx Means that you would have to guess whether to agree hearts or punt 3NT. Whereas with the sequence: 2C* - 2D* 2H - 2S 3H - ? The responder has much more info by the time they come to make the decision. Here they would agree hearts as they know the opener has 6+ now. There are ups and downs to both methods, but my preference is playing 2D* as a relay. Hope I've convinced you as to why! Cheers, Dom

Will try to slow down in future vids! I just have so much to say haha. Dom

Correct! But it is our only chance so one you have to take! Dom

Keep at it! The short term memory of what cards have just gone dramatically improves after you have played a few hundred (or thousand!) hands. Cheers, Dom

Glad it was helpful !

Hi, East's bid of 2H* was a transfer to spades so it shows 5+ spades. In effect they have shown their spades with a 2H* bid so their second bid of 3C shows a 4 card club suit too, which means they have then shown 5:4 in spades and hearts. In my opinion East should have a slightly stronger hand to show their second suit at the 3 level, as they have forced the bidding to game with only 11 points. Hope this helps, Dom

Will endeavour to do that in future videos! Cheers, Dom

Hi Wiliam, Depends on the scoring of the game that you are playing, but I agree with you, if you are playing teams/imps, where making your contract is of paramount importance. In most club level competition, however, the scoring is matchpointed pairs, where risking your contract for overtricks will often be a good idea, as overtricks are very important to get your score to the top of the leaderboard (this can often be by only 30 points or so!). Most of my lessons are aimed at those playing in regular club duplicate sessions, and therefore there is often a 'pairs bias' in what I am talking about! Hope this helps, Dom

Will endeavour to slow down for future vids! Dom

Hiya, Yes, I also play that system but I think in most cases you will want a fit for their opening suit in order to bid this 2NT* forcing enquiry. What do you do if partner has a feature in the 'wrong suit' or is minimum and so just repeats their suit at the 3 level? With no fit you possibly have a problem, so I think you should have a fit (2+ cards) to bid 2NT* in response to a weak 2. There is of course the fringe case (as we can see in the video) where you have an extremely strong hand and you think 3NT might make even opposite a minimum weak 2, so you could make the argument to bid 2NT* with these hands, but if your only end goal is to end up in 3NT (because you have no fit for their suit) then you might as well just leap straight to it I think. Not an easy hand to bid given the weak 2 opener so I can see arguments for different approaches to be fair. Hope this helps :) Cheers, Dom

Hiya, More often than not, there will be an extra trick if playing in a trump contract versus a no trump contract (with the same cards). This means that you will frequently get 650 vs 630 or 420 vs 400 when playing in a major. This isn't always true of course, but it is around 90% of the time where the major will be better (assuming there is an 8+ card fit there of course). Cheers, Dom

Most people play 3S promises four cards.

@@d95mback Not if you play major suit five. Besides, if you change suit you definitely promise five cards AND a at least one high card. Ten-nine-xx definitely do not qualify. Besides, 1S-2D do not represent 15 HCP. Bidding a minor suit makes no sense at all. You have AKx in your partner suit and propose a minor suit? If I were in S I would assume you have at best a singleton in Spades, if not a void. And I would also assume you have something like 10-11 HCP and a very strong diamond suit.

@@rufus2731if you play it that way, as a three card limit raise, you are far too strong for that bid here.

Hi all, Yes, agree with d95 above. 3S would promise 4 cards in this case as this pair are playing 4 card majors not 5, and even if 3S only needed 3 cards, your hand is much too strong for a limit raise here. Cheers, Dom

His partner overcalled 1 spade

Yes, there was a 1S overcal by partner. Cheers, Dom

Hi Joshua, Yes, I think a 2C opener by South would certainly help them here. You normally would require more points to open 2C but as you say, the spade suit is magnificent, and the hand is only a 3 loser. When unbalanced you should look at your losing trick count to decide whether to open 2C or not. I would say with 3 losers or fewer, it merits a 2C opener, so this hand definitely qualifies! Good catch! Cheers, Dom

Yes, not a bad idea for a possible extra trick. As you can see, this finesse would fail, but that is not a reason not to try it! Dom