At white, you have:
AJ87542
9
KQ7
104
LHO passes and partner opens 1
, you respond 1
, partner rebids 3
. This I take as game forcing and so I rebid 3
taking it slowly in the game forcing situation. Partner now raises to 4
. I still have lots of unadvertised strength and it seemed that there was no alternative to Blackwood 4N. (comments?) Partner responded 5
showing 3 keycards.
1
1
3
3
4
4NT
5
?
Would you now go straight to 6
? Or try 5
which I believe is a trump Queen ask? If partner denies the Q
and just bids 5
would you pass or continue to 6
? I went on to 6
on the basis that if partner had a doubleton spade without the queen, the slam would still be slightly better than evens and partner might even have 3 spades.
Partner's hand was disappointing:
K3
AK764
A8
QJ96
The 4
was led but I still went off when RHO had
Q109 and I went with the odds and played for the drop.
I appreciate that with a good 17 a rebid of 2
can sometimes result in a missed game. Nevertheless I believe that a rebid of 2NT (18-19) fits the bill much better. I do notice that a 5422 hand does seem to draw partners into showing their 2nd suit. Now:
1
1
2NT ?
Am I too good for 4
, and would 3
be a sign off? What would 3
be taken as? A Wolf sign-off? (3
is a relay to 3
and then 3
is a sign-off) Then 3
would be forcing. So we get to;
1
1
2NT 3
?
Surely opener must next make the courtesy cue bid of 4
. Now if you play that this bid denies 1st or 2nd round control in clubs then we sign off in 4
safely.
What if you are not playing the Wolff sign-off. What would be sensible?