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In today’s hand, east has a monster 17 point no trump. Although there are no touching honors, there are no jacks either and only one queen that is situated comfortably in a nice 5 card suit. I think opening 1NT is an underbid and you should treat this hand as an 18 pointer and open 1D planning to rebid 2NT or reverse into spades.
Either way, with proper hand evaluation you should be able to reach six spades.
Here are three possible auctions:
1.----=W-------N-------E-------S
---.1D------pass
1S------.pass---.4S------pass
4NT---=pass----5C/D*-.pass
6S------pass---..pass----pass
* 3 keycards
East’s 4S shows a good 19+ dummy points with 4+ spades and no voids or singletons, otherwise a splinter bid would be in order- enough to be in game opposite a 5 or 6 point minimum. West, with 11 HCPs, a 9 card trump fit, first or second round control in all the side suits and an excellent 4 card side suit to boot, suspects this hand belongs in slam. A check on keycards with Blackwood reveals that there is only one missing so you bid the slam.
2a.----W-------N-------E-------S
----1NT----pass
2H-----..pass----3S-----.pass
4C------.pass----4D-----.pass
4H-----=pass----4NT---.pass
5C/D*-=pass---=6S-----.pass
pass----.pass
2b.----W-------N-------E-------S
----1NT----pass
2H-----..pass----3S-----.pass
4H-----=pass----4NT---.pass
5C/D*-=pass---=6S-----.pass
pass----.pass
* 1 keycard
East’s 3S bid is a ‘superaccept’. It shows 4 card spade support and a hand worth 18+ dummy points after re-evaluation. This is almost as strong as the 4S bid in the first auction. It’s just one point less.
West can pass with a bust, bid 4 with a modest hand or make a move towards slam with a control bid or 4NT for the same reasons as in auction 1. The control bid offers the best chance to find out something that might lead to a superior contract. For example, if east can determine that west has the diamond king, 6NT might be the top score in a matchpoint game. Not that 6S is bad, but 6NT is better.
In auction 2a the EW system allows west to control bid a king and after a second round of control bids, east can be certain that west has the king of clubs and ace of hearts. East knows they have at least 4 keycards and since West has not limited his hand east should ask for more keycards, in case they hold all 5 and can bid beyond 6S.
In 2b, east doesn’t know about the king if clubs but everything else is the same and he goes on to bid 6S.
This hand goes to show that accurate bidding coupled with good hand evaluation can get you to a difficult to find contract.
The play is trivial, losing 1 trump and eventually ruffing a heart and a club.
In the common game, bidding and making 6S was worth 98% of the matchpoints. Bidding 4 and making 6 was less than 50%.
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