[sceptic]

Scoring: IMP

---

West North East South

 -     -     Pass  1♣
 Pass  1♥    Pass  4♥
 Pass  4NT   Pass  5♣
 Pass  6♥    Pass  Pass
 Pass  

My pard jumped to 4 hearts, because he had shape, I said he should splinter to show the shape, I also thought 4 hearts shows 19 hcp min

ur opinions please

[P_Marlowe]

was this a regular partnrship?
A splinter certainly makes sense,
but if one is not sure about the
meaning of 4D, 4H is a perfect
practical bid, 16HCP+points for the
single add up to 19.

With kind regards
Marlowe

[EricK]

I would tend to agree that a 4♥ bid is very strong but denies a singleton. But you found the slam anyway, so well done!

[mikeh]

P_Marlowe, on Aug 13 2006, 08:48 AM, said:

was this a regular partnrship?
A splinter certainly makes sense,
but if one is not sure about the
meaning of 4D, 4H is a perfect
practical bid, 16HCP+points for the
single add up to 19.

With kind regards
Marlowe

agree

[ochinko]

Points are irrelevant here. Every time I have 4+ trumps and 5 losers, i bid 4 in the major. Not that there's anything wrong in a splinter, of course, except that it could be misunderstood, as the others pointed out.

[Wackojack]

Assuming you are playing with advanced or above, then because 1c-1h-2d would be forcing, what would 1c-1h-3d mean? With a few of my f2f partners I would assume this was a splinter. With one partner 1c-1h-4d is a void splinter. Once I was playng with "an expert" as labelled, and the bidding went 1d-1s-and I splintered with a bid of 4c with a singleton club 4 card spade support and a strong hand. I was very surprised when he thought I had clubs and raised to 5. Aren't splinters assumed with knowledgeable players?

[neilkaz]

The jump to 4♥ shows 4 card support and enough to make 4♥ opposite a min response of 1♥.

The opening hand is worth 19 pts in support of ♥, and has strong trumps and useful looking ♣. Perhaps responder has wasted values in ♦, perhaps not.

I'd find no fault in a cautious 3♥ here, but 4♥ or splintering is fine. I'd splinter if playing them.

After any of the 3 bids, responder with 16 support points should go looking for slam.

.. neilkaz ..

[blackshoe]

Wackojack, on Aug 13 2006, 06:25 PM, said:

Aren't splinters assumed with knowledgeable players?

Heh. You know that saying? "when you assume, you make an ass of u and me"?

[ochinko]

You can have both. For example, even with

♠ Kxx
♥ AQJT
♦ 2
♣ KQ753

4♥ has a good chance to make, and you show a limited hand. But with

♠ KQx
♥ AQJT
♦ 2
♣ KQ753

you could splinter to show 4- losers. Again, it's not about the points when you have at least 4:4 fit, and such a good distribution.

[barmar]

While I certainly would have splintered, would it really have helped on this particular hand? If anything, I think a ♦ splinter might have slowed you down, because your ♦K is wasted.

[starfruit]

In the past, I've been playing a direct raise as balanced raise with 18-19 HCP.

How about hands that go : 1♣ - 1♥ - 2NT - Any - 4♥?
Now with certain partners I'm playing this as balanced 18-19HCP with 4♥ so a direct raise to 4♥ anyways denies a balanced hand.
(This method has some problems too, as sometimes if partner showed 5♥ with a rebid he might think that you only have 4.)

So for some time this sequence actually didn't appear on the table as when we're strong enough to raise to 4 without a balanced hand, we often have a singleton and thus we'll splinter.
It also denied a 6-4-2-1 with good minors as we'll bid 4♣ with that.
So what's left is. . .
How about using it as 5-4 in ♣s and ♥s and 2-2 in the majors?

If not, I'm wondering if playing a splinter raise with 5 losers and a direct raise with 4 losers would be better. Otherwise it seems difficult to carry on over a 5 loser 4♥ raise without knowing where's the wastage