You are South, holding:

 Q 10 8 6 3 2
 Q
 6 
 K J 9 7 3

South dealer, N-S vul.

You consider your hand unfit for a weak 2 opening because your suit is not too robust and you have a five-card side suit as well. A moment later, you have repented it, since the auction has risen a bit too steeply for your taste:

South	West	North	East
Rose	Klukowski	Sheehan	Jezioro
pass	2	pass	4
??

2 is a weak two, while 4H is ambiguous: it could be either a continuation of the preempt, or a sincere game bid ... or both of them!

Pass is the sage choice; 4 is the temerary bid. In any case, what do you bid now?

    (Scroll down - see what happened at the table.. )

This was board 32 of G.Britain v Poland for the 13th qualifying round of the 1981 Open World Championship.

The full deal was:

                           K 9 5 4
                           A 5 2
                           10 4 3
                           A 5 2


 J                                                  A 7
 K J 10 8 7 4                                       9 6 3
 Q J 7 5                                            A K 9 8 2
 6 4                                                Q 10 8

                            Q 10 8 6 3 2
                            Q
                            6
                            K J 9 7 3

South had no conventional call available to describe his hand: 4NT would be a call for the minors, while double would tend to show a different hand. However, Rose, the British South, knew that his partner had an inference available after him bidding 4: since he did not open a weak two nor a three bid in spades, it would be "obvious" that his hand was two-suited. Hence, if North were short in spades he'd probably ask for South's second suit. Thus, Rose bid 4, which turned out to be an excellent move.

4 for E-W is always on, while N-S can make 10 or 11 tricks in 4! The icing on Rose's cake was that Jezioro, the East player, thought that Rose was saving, so he applied the axe -but it turned out that it was a boomerang, when Rose guessed clubs and scored a doubled overtrick for 990! At the other table, Milde opened the South hand with a "Wilkosz" 2 (showing any 5-5 except for the two minors) so N-S found easily their fit and bid 4. They were doubled again, but no overtrick was made, so G.Britain gained 5 IMPs after all.

Playing against Argentina, Meckstroth (making his debut in world championships) passed as well the South hand as a dealer and later elected to pass in Rose's position. This was a double game swing against the USA, 14 IMPs, when at the other table N-S bid and made 4 against silent opposition.

Special thanks to Al "BiigAl" Lochli, District 16 ACBL Internet Coordinator for assistance with the HTML presentation.

Nikos Sarantakos,
Luxembourg, June 1998