What should I Bid? - Best enquiry for September 2008

The best submission for September came from Brian Thorp.

 Hand:  Teams, nil vulnerable with South the dealer, as West I held:

64  AK1062  AQ2  QJ8

Bidding:	West	North	East	South
				1
	1	Pass	1	Pass
	1NT

Comments:    East then continued unsuccessfully, mainly because he couldn't judge how strong West was.

EW play:
- that a new suit response to an overcall is constructive but non-forcing
- an immediate 1NT overcall shows 15-18 with a stop.

Do you agree with West's bidding on the hand in question?

In general, what strength would you recommend for an overcaller's rebid of NT after partner has responded in a new suit?

Thanks,
Brian

Sartaj's Reply:

Hi Brian,

This is a difficult question!

A widely recommended practice is to play a new suit as forcing at the one-level but as non-forcing at the two-level. However a lot of people play variants such as yourself with new suits non-forcing always and others with new suits forcing always.

The 1NT rebid by the overcaller has not been well-defined in bridge literature in general. And since this occurence is rare, not much thought has been put into it as well.

I would suggest that one should play the 1NT rebid as 9 -14 or so, for it is more important to accurately state the nature of one's hand (by avoiding rebidding a overcalled suit without 6 cards, for example) than it is to accurately state high-cards (the hand is likely to be a part-score hand).

15+ or more hands should start with 1NT overcall or cue-bid the opponents' suit at their second go (or jump rebid in NT) to create a one-round force.

I would probably go for a 2NT rebid and would have chosen 1H over 1NT in the first place too.

This is a great bidding forum problem and I wouldn't be surprised if we see votes for various other actions by different strong players. 

 
Sartaj

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