[msjennifer]

pescetom, on 2018-October-18, 15:18, said:

I follow you to a certain point. After the 4S bid, North knows that there is a suit fit and as responder holding 5 losers he must be intrigued by South's jump bid. How many losers does he credit South with, to pass?

SIR,The spade fit is only partial as S has by his bid signed off.With only 2 guaranteed cover cards he has signed off as the value of DQ is not known.Exchange Norths Diamond and Clubs and a small slam is next to hopeless.A small slam requires 4 cover cards in South hand to play a 6S..A spade lead will be a marked lead. and North just can not ruff his club loser as a trump will come back as soon as the lead is lost in clubs.If S had both the heart AK in place of Q then the slam is worth while as one club loser can be discarded .Everything will depend on Both H AND S suits behaving or the diamonds breaking or the DJ dropping doubleton.A lot of guessing is necessary in heart suit also on a trump lead.All this because South simply does not have the 4 cover cards..We have the system bid of 5D for some other hand with a singleton club in N which asks the opener if he has 4 cover cards in Spades and Diamond and ONLY COUNTING AN ACE or AK in the jump suit as a cover card in clubs and hearts.As S has only three namely the DA,DQ,and HA he will sign off in 5 S.Furthermore if S has xx in clubs the slam is already a dead proposition.We do not like to bid doubtful slams if we can not get the required information from either hand.And by the way I forgot to mention that the v3H bid by S is NONFORCING.A North holding Kxxx-x-xxxx-Kxxx can happily PASS.