In contract bridge, a two suiter is a hand containing cards mostly from two of the four suits. Traditionally a hand is considered a two suiter if it contains at least ten cards in two suits, with the two suits not differing in length by more than one card. Depending on suit quality and partnership agreement different classification schemes are viable. The more modern trend is to lower the threshold of ten cards to nine cards and consider 5-4 distributions also two suiters.
When including two suited hands with 5-4 distribution, two suiters have a high likelihood of occurrence, and the modern preemptive style is to incorporate such two-suited hands in the arsenal of preemptive openings. Example of such a preemptive conventional opening is the Muiderberg convention. Some take this aggressive style even further and use Ekren to preemptively open on a 4-4 in the majors.
Contract bridge, or simply bridge, is a trick-taking card game using a standard 52-card deck. In its basic format, it is played by four players in two competing partnerships, with partners sitting opposite each other around a table. Millions of people play bridge worldwide in clubs, tournaments, online and with friends at home, making it one of the world's most popular card games, particularly among seniors. The World Bridge Federation (WBF) is the governing body for international competitive bridge, with numerous other bodies governing bridge at the regional level.
Stayman is a bidding convention in the card game contract bridge. It is used by a partnership to find a 4-4 or 5-3 trump fit in a major suit after making a one notrump (1NT) opening bid and it has been adapted for use after a 2NT opening, a 1NT overcall, and many other natural notrump bids.
In the card game of bridge, the unusual notrump is a conventional overcall showing a two-suited hand. It was originally devised by Al Roth in 1948 with Tobias Stone, to show the minor suits after the opponents opened in a major.
A bridge convention is an agreement about an artificial call or a set of related artificial calls. Calls made during the auction phase of a contract bridge game convey information about the player's card holdings. Calls may be "natural" or "artificial".
The Michaels cuebid is a conventional bid used in the card game contract bridge. First devised by Michael Michaels of Miami Beach, FL, it is an overcaller's cuebid in opponent's opening suit and is normally used to show a two-suited hand with at least five cards in each suit and eight or more points.
Canapé is a bridge bidding method in which the second suit bid may be longer than or at least as long as the first. The name Canapé is the french word for "couch".
A bidding system in contract bridge is the set of agreements and understandings assigned to calls and sequences of calls used by a partnership, and includes a full description of the meaning of each treatment and convention. The purpose of bidding is for each partnership to ascertain which contract, whether made or defeated and whether bid by them or by their opponents, would give the partnership their best scoring result.
Preempt is a bid in contract bridge whose primary objectives are (1) to thwart opponents' ability to bid to their best contract, with some safety, and (2) to fully describe one's hand to one's partner in a single bid. A preemptive bid is usually made by jumping, i.e. skipping one or more bidding levels. Since it deprives the opponents of the bidding space, it is expected that they will either find a wrong contract of their own, or fail to find any. A preemptive bid often has the aim of a save, where a partnership bids a contract knowing it cannot be made, but assumes that, the penalty will still be smaller than the value of opponents' bid and made contract.
These terms are used in contract bridge, using duplicate or rubber scoring. Some of them are also used in whist, bid whist, the obsolete game auction bridge, and other trick-taking games. This glossary supplements the Glossary of card game terms.
The weak two bid is a common treatment used in the game of contract bridge, where an opening bid of two diamonds, hearts or spades signifies a weak hand with a long suit. It is used in combination with the strong two clubs bid and is a form of preemptive bid. The term refers to an opening bid, and is not to be confused with the "weak jump overcall", which denotes a similar type of hand, but is bid over an opponent's opening bid.
In the card game contract bridge, a takeout double is a low-level conventional call of "Double" over an opponent's bid as a request for partner to bid his best of the unbid suits. The most common takeout double is after an opponent's opening bid of one of a suit where the double shows a hand with opening values, support for all three unbid suits and shortness in the suit doubled. Normally, the partner of the doubler must bid his best suit but may pass if (a) his right hand opponent intervenes or (b) on the more rare occasions when his hand is such that he wishes to convert the takeout double to a penalty double.
In the card game contract bridge, DONT is a conventional overcall used to interfere with an opponent's one notrump (1NT) opening bid. DONT, an acronym for Disturb Opponents' Notrump, was designed by Marty Bergen, and is therefore also referred to as "Bergen over Notrump". Although the method is often criticized for being too nebulous, it remains fairly popular. The convention was first published in the September/October 1989 issue of Bridge Today.
Landy, named after its inventor Alvin Landy is the first of several conventional defenses created to compete against an opponent's one notrump (1NT) opening. Landy is a 2♣ overcall of the opponents' 1NT opening to show at least four cards in each of the major suits; all other bids are natural. Requirements for the overcall vary from partnership to partnership: some require 5-5, some 5-4, and yet others only 4-4. The partner can take a preference to either major or make a non-forcing bid of a suit; 2NT is used as a forcing query.
Muiderberg is a bidding convention in the card game bridge. It is a two-level preemptive opening based on a two-suiter with precisely a five-card major and a minor suit. In Muiderberg the 2♥ opening denotes five hearts and an unknown minor suit, whilst 2♠ denotes five spades and an unknown minor suit. The convention is also known as the Dutch Two, Lucas Two or Woo Two opening. The convention is named after the Dutch village Muiderberg, the residence of the designers of the convention - Onno Janssens and Willem Boegem.
The Raptor 1NT overcall over an opposing 1-level suit opening is a contract bridge convention that indicates a two-suited hand with exactly four cards in the unbid major and a longer suit in an unbid minor.
In contract bridge, an overcall is a bid made after an opening bid has been made by an opponent; the term refers only to the first such bid. A direct overcall is such a bid made by the player seated immediately to the left of the opener, i.e. next in the bidding rotation; an overcall in the 'last seat', i.e. by the player to the right of opener, which is made after two intervening passes, is referred to as a balancing or protective overcall.
In the game of bridge, Ekren refers to a preemptive opening of 2♦ defined as 4-4, 4-5, 5-4 or 5-5 in the majors and 3-10 high card points. This conventional preempt was designed by Bjørn Olav Ekren from Norway and is an example of the modern style of highly aggressive preemptive bidding.
In the card game bridge, Namyats is a conventional agreement to open hands with a long major suit that are too strong for a direct preemptive opening with a 'two-under' transfer bid. When the long suit is in hearts, opener bids 4♣ and when in spades bids 4♦. Accordingly, the method was originally named 'Four Club and Four Diamond Opening Transfers'; it is also referred to as 'Mitchell Transfers', after the developer of this bidding method, Victor Mitchell. The name 'Namyats' is the surname of Mitchell's bridge partner, Samuel Stayman, spelled backwards. In England, this convention is known as 'South African Texas', a name borrowed from a similar variant on the Texas transfer convention played over 1NT opening bids.
Unusual vs. unusual is a competitive bidding convention used in contract bridge by the opening side after an opponent has made an overcall showing two suits.
Antispades Twos is the name of a bidding convention in the card game bridge. It is a two-level pre-emptive opening based on either a 6-card suit or a two-suiter with at least nine cards distributed across any two suits.
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