Bridge Tips - Bidding, No. 5 - Cue Bidding

You have opened 1♥ and your partner has responded 3♥. What do you bid with the following hand?

 ♠ Kx         ♥ KQxx     ♦ AKxxx     ♣ Kx

Answer

3♠. Whilst Basic Acol assumes a Cue Bid shows first-round control of the suit, Advanced Acol Cue Bids shows either first- or second-round control, always Cue Bidding up the line.

It is usually the situation that there is not enough bidding space to identify second round controls. It is also often the case that a partnership has a lot of points, is missing one Ace but does not know whether the King in that suit is also missing - and the opponents can take Ace and King off the top!

The great benefit of this style is that if a Cue Bid has missed out a suit, then partner knows that you have neither first nor second round control in that suit - and the embarrassment of a slam going one off when opponents take the Ace and King is avoided. The downside of this Cue Bidding technique is that occasionally, you won’t know whether the Cue Bid is first or second round control. But I would put two arguments forward for this technique: -

1.    If you read the expert books or look at expert quizzes, articles or Simultaneous commentaries, you will find they use this regularly.
2.    My partner and I adopted this about two years ago. There have been many instances where we have stayed out of an unmakeable slam, but I cannot remember an instance where we have got into trouble because we didn’t know whether we had first or second round control.