The Junior Pairs Club Championship is now in progress with the 12-pair field having played 24 of the 44 boards in the first session on Tuesday. They will complete playing four boards against each other pair in the field next Tuesday.

That is a lot of boards for players at this level, but this format produces the fairest result – the winners will be the pairs who can stay patient and keep their concentration right through the evening – full results next week.

I had another hand prepared for this week, because I am travelling and off island except for one day – last Tuesday. Well, I landed on Monday night on the British Airways flight, with one day before I flew again, only to find an e-mail from Geoff Bell asking me to look at Board 20 from the Monday game – of course, I could not resist, and found the hand really interesting, so, here it is (see Figure 1)!

East opened two clubs at every table with that rock-crusher, but then the bidding over the different tables was all over the place!

A number of pairs played the inevitable NT, some at the three level and some at the six level, which many do when there is misfit, and that contract failed by four, five and six tricks at different tables.

Two pairs got to six clubs, which made with an overtrick, and a few played in six hearts which also failed by a lot!

How should one bid the hand? Once West opens two clubs, East knows that a slam is almost certainly on and should immediately bid 4NT which, since no suit has been agreed, asks only for Aces and not for key cards.

When West shows three Aces, East needs to bid a sensible seven clubs and not seven NoTrump as West could easily have a void – which she did.

This hand would be more interesting if East were the dealer and opened 3NT showing a long, totally solid, minor with no other high cards – now West has the thrill of bidding six or seven clubs with a void! That opportunity does not come up often!

There is a great lesson here – if partner shows a weak hand with a long suit and you have a great hand but no support you will usually do better playing in partner’s suit as opposed to NT – his hand could end up giving you zero tricks in NT but will always give you a bunch of tricks played in his suit.

So if you hold AKxx, x, AKxx, Kxxx and partner opens three hearts you have only one bid – four hearts.

Partner can hold xx, KQJ10987, xx, xx – 3NT is a disaster but four hearts will make either ten or 11 tricks depending on who has the club Ace.

Thanks, Geoff! And to my readers, feel free to send me questions or hands of interest – I’m always on the lookout for new material.

• David Ezekiel can be reached on davidezekiel999@gmail.com

BRIDGE CLUB RESULTS

Friday, March 7

1 Tony Saunders/Patricia Siddle

2 Lorna Anderson/Joyce Pearson

3 Peter Donnellan/Miodrag Novakovic

Monday, March 10

North/South

1 Jack Rhind/Martha Ferguson

2 Richard Gray/Wendy Gray

3 Gertrude Barker/Jane smith

East/West

1 Peter Donnellan/Lynanne Bolton

2 Patricia Siddle/Diana Diel

3 Margaret Way/Gill Butterfield

Tuesday, March 11

North/South

1 Erika Jones/Caitlin Conyers

2 Amanda Ingham/Heidi Dyson

East/West

1 Julia Tadman/Joshimar Hussey

2 Ross Cooper/Keri McKittrick

Wednesday, March 12

1 Elysa Burland/Martha Ferguson (Tied 1st)

2 Elizabeth McKee/Rachael Gosling (Tied 1st)

3 Judith Bussell/Stephanie Kyme

Thursday, March 13

1 John F W Glynn/Rachael Gosling

2 Judith Bussell/Stephanie Kyme

3 Malcolm Moseley/Mark Stevens