The Opening Bid The essence of good Bridge is that a partnership should make the majority of contracts that they bid and not find themselves being too heavily penalised for the contracts that they cannot make – either because they have decided to sacrifice or because they are in a contract that fails due to unlucky breaks or very good defence. In short, the partnership must be in the right contract, whether that contract is a part-score, a game or a slam. Arriving at the right contract is not always easy and therefore the partners need to understand, with a good deal of precision, exactly what they are saying to each other. Such an understanding takes time and experience to develop, of course, but there are a number of basic principles involved that will make the process considerably easier. These are:- 1). Bid your longest suit first or, when you have two suits of equal length, bid the higher ranking first (except when you have two 4- card suits of s and another, when you should open the lower- ranking suit). 2). If your hand is ‘balanced’ (i.e. holding either 4-3-3-3 or 4-4-3-2 or 5-3-3-2 shape) make a bid in no-trumps at the appropriate level at the first available opportunity, unless partner has already shown support for your long suit {see below:- ‘Opening Balanced Hands’}. 3). If your hand is ‘unbalanced’ (i.e. holding any other shape than the three outlined above) always decide before you bid what your next bid is going to be, assuming that partner will make a minimum response to your opening bid. 4). As a first priority, find the suit where you have a ‘fit’ with your partner (i.e. where your combined holding in a suit consists of at least 8 of the 13 cards). Finding a fit is much more important than jumping around to show a strong hand - if you do this you will find yourself playing in contracts with a totally unsuitable trump holding or (even worse) playing in a no-trump contract with two wildly unbalanced hands. Sometimes you will make these contracts – but far more often, you won’t. 5). Once you have found a fit, make a limit bid. 6). Once you have made a limit bid – either by bidding no-trumps or by making a limit raise in a previously bid suit - accept that the final decision about where the contract should be played is to be made by your partner. 7). Do not bid your partner’s hand for him – you cannot possibly evaluate it as well as he can, since you can’t see it. 8). Until your partner tells you otherwise, always assume that he has a minimum for his response(s). If you don’t make this assumption, you will be playing far too many contracts at too high a level. 9). Whenever possible, make the bid that communicates the clearest picture of your hand. Without the most accurate picture your partner cannot possibly be expected to evaluate the merits of the combined holding and you are therefore less likely to reach the best contract. 10). If you have no more than you have already promised after your partner makes a limit bid – PASS! These principles can be called the Ten Commandments. Like the original commandments it is remarkable how often they are broken, even by players who should know better. If you learn them and abide by them, you will rarely go badly wrong. The most difficult hands to bid are those where you and your partner do not have the confidence to trust each other’s bids. Without partnership understanding, you will finish in part-score contracts while others are bidding and making game, or in game where others are bidding lay-down slams. Alternatively you will bid too high, conceding hefty penalties to opponents who have done little or nothing to earn their good score. The only sure route to partnership understanding is by learning (amicably) from your joint mistakes. If a misunderstanding has occurred, discuss the causes carefully until a common understanding has been reached. If you do this, you should be able to avoid making the same errors again. Eventually you will run out of situations where bidding misunderstandings occur! Before moving on to the discussion of the requirements for making an opening bid, two further concepts need to be examined. Firstly, the concept of shape. Of the billions of possible hands that you could hold, there are only two types – either ‘balanced’ or ‘unbalanced’. The methods of bidding your hand varies according to the shape, so it is important to recognise which type of hand you hold before you start to bid. The second important concept is the idea of a limit bid. It is very important to comprehend that a limit bid makes a statement about both the shape and strength of your hand, in terms of a minimum and maximum number of high-card points (HCP). There is no bid more important in Bridge, no matter what system you play, since without a method of limiting the strength of your hand your partnership cannot control the point at which the auction should stop. Thus, any bid that is made during the auction can be defined as either a limit bid or an unlimited bid. The basic distinction between the two is that a limit bid is never forcing, whereas an unlimited bid may or may not be forcing, depending on the circumstances. It follows therefore that if you want your partner to bid again, you must not make a limit bid. However, refer back to the fifth commandment at this point - 'once you have found a fit, make a limit bid.’ Unless your hand is too strong to make a limit raise, it is a capital offence to break this commandment! Opening Balanced Hands To open a balanced hand there are only two requirements:- 1). At least 12 high-card points. 2). Either any 4-3-3-3 shape, any 4-4-3-2 shape or any 5-3-3-2 shape. Your aim with these hands is to make a bid in no-trumps at the first available opportunity, unless your partner makes a limit raise in your first-bid suit. The point and level at which you bid no-trumps specifies your high-card point count within a three point range. Thus, your bid in no-trumps is a limit bid, designating both the shape and strength of your hand. The method of bidding different strengths is as follows:- 1). 12-14 HCP - Open 1NT. 2). 15-16 HCP - Open with 1 of your longest suit and rebid 1NT over partner’s response (or rebid 2NT if partner has responded with a 2-level bid). 3). 17-18 HCP - Open with 1 of your longest suit and rebid 2NT over partner’s response (or rebid 3NT over a 2- level response). 4). 19 HCP - Open 1 of your longest suit and rebid 3NT whatever partner responds. 5). 20-22 HCP - Open 2NT. 6). 23+ HCP - Open 2. and rebid 2NT with 23-24 HCP and 3NT with 25+ HCP. These six possibilities cover all the ways of showing a balanced hand containing 12 or more high-card points. Note that the bids comprise a simple two-step code, telling your partner within a maximum three point range how many points you hold as well as the balanced shape. In theory it takes a combined holding of 25 HCP to bid a game and 33 HCP to bid a no-trump slam, whenever both you and your partner hold balanced hands. Once you have shown your hand partner should be able to estimate where the contract should be played, simply by adding the minimum number of points that you could hold to his own. Opening Unbalanced Hands The requirements for opening unbalanced hands are less stringent than those for balanced hands. The difference is that the more unbalanced your hand the fewer high-card points you need to open the bidding. Example 1 A 10 9 8 6 3 Q J 10 7 2 10 4 . - - - - It is definitely acceptable to open the bidding with 1 on this hand, since you have a safe rebid of 2 whatever your partner responds. The lack of high-card points is more than compensated for by the shape. The danger with this type of hand, of course, is that partner may well get over-excited by the opening bid if he holds a good hand – thus landing you in an impossible contract before you have had a chance to show the lack of high-card strength. In order to avoid this danger you need to develop an understanding with your partner of the type of hands that constitute an unbalanced opening bid and how the different types should be shown. To do this you need a set of rules that can be applied to all the possible auctions that you could encounter. This set of rules for bidding unbalanced hands, coupled with the rules for bidding balanced hands, comprises your basic system. Perhaps the best method of enumerating this set of rules is to describe all the possible hands you could open, from the weakest to the strongest, complete with the possible bids that you can make. As with the method for showing strength as well as shape in bidding balanced hands, the combination of your bids for bidding unbalanced hands is also a code. Provided both you and your partner have spent the time necessary to agree what particular bids mean, you should not have too much difficulty in expressing the nature of your hand – nor should you have much difficulty in understanding your partner’s bids.