Playing Together For The First Time The Hard Way

Pamela and I get along very well and under the circumstances I think our results have been very good. However the fact that we have had little partnership discussion and no experience playing together does cause some difficulties. I think that a significant amount of the error we have made come from our inexperience together. A lot of the rest is some poor decisions or judgment on my part. Sometimes you make a bid that seems reasonable but when you look at it in retrospect it was clearly the wrong choice. Here is a case in point.

I held:  ♠ 6 ♥ AKQ8 ♦ J84 ♣ QJ1084

Partner opened 1♦ and I heard 2♠ on my right. I had clubs and hearts so I made a negative double. The problem with this bid is it tends to show hearts more than clubs and it definitely doesn’t show the strength of my hand. It is a lazy bid (as Ray pointed out later). 3♣ is a better choice. I did get punished a lot for this decision. The next hand passed and so did Pamela. The whole hand was

	♠ K Q 8 5 4 2
	♥ 7 5
	♦ Q 10 6
	♣ 3 2
♠ A J 7 3		♠ 6
♥ 10		♥ A K Q 8
♦ A K 7 3		♦ J 8 4
♣ A K 7 5		♣ Q J 10 8 4
	♠ 10 9
	♥ J 9 6 4 3 2
	♦ 9 5 2
	♣ 9 6

As you can see Pamela has a very awkward bid over the negative double and like many others in the field she decided to take her plus (in this case 500) but 6♣ is the right place to play the hand  At the other table we continued to have some misfortune when our opponents bid 7♣ which happens to make as the cards lie.

If you do decide to travel to China then if, like me, you have asthma make sure you start taking medicine before you come. The climate in Shanghai is very polluted and I have already developed a cold/asthma. The biggest problem is that I can’t talk. So a quiet Linda may make Ray happy. Some peace at last.