[Rebound]

Hi. An auction occurred in which I failed to anticipate partner's hand thinking he had made a rather awkward unneccessarily space-consuming call. On later reflection, however, I felt that his call perfectly fit his hand and I would like some opinions on it.

Firstly, in the absence of the actual hand to prevent bias, I would like your take on this auction:

1♥* - 3♦** - 4♠!

*11-15 - 5+ ♥
** singleton, trump support, invitational or better.
I thought 4♠ ate too much room to be a good call particularly since it is generally not necessary, even silly, to splinter over a splinter.

When I looked at his hand later I saw why. Partner held 4 diamonds to the 10 so no wasted values, and a stiff spade. Therefore, all his high-cards were concentrated in the 2 remaining suits. Does this make sense?

I believe that on the actual hand (which is somewhat irrelevant to the topic) partner had other, better calls from which to choose but I am curious to know if any of you see any merit in this call given the contraints, i.e. no wasted values in the splinter suit and a stiff of your own. It has long been my experience that a singleton opposite a singleton can be of great value once it becomes known.

[FrancesHinden]

Without any discussion, I would expect 4S to be a very suitable hand with a void.

[Rebound]

Alas, partner did this with a stiff, not a void.

But then, I misinterpreted your statement. I understand now. However, this was with a partner I have played with for a long time and I know his style. I was quite certain the call was showing a stiff spade (and I was right).

[joshs]

Kit Woolsey once wrote an article recomending responding to splinter's by showing your own singleton if you have one (you, of course, have less options than usual if you don't have one). Its an interesting idea, since sometimes two minimum hands with "matching singletons" fit very well, assuming you have enough trumps...

[Gerben42]

Good idea, I wouldn't be surprised if partner had:

♠ -
♥ KQJxxx
♦ xxxx
♣ AKx

[Rebound]

Yes, but would you be surpised if partner had x AKJxx xxxx Axx ?

[han]

Rebound, on Feb 14 2006, 01:13 PM, said:

Yes, but would you be surpised if partner had x AKJxx xxxx Axx ?

Yes, I would be very surprised if partner moved beyond game with that hand after I made a mini-splinter.