The Five Level Belongs to the Opponents
"The Five-Level Belongs to the Opponents" was a BOLS Bridge Tip written by the late American expert Ed Mansfield. From 1974 - 1994, BOLS Royal Distilleries of Holland sponsored a writing competition for bridge advice. Manfield's winning tip in 1987 recommends avoiding "five over five" bids, e.g. bidding
.
"Many factors combine to make it usually unwise to bid five over five:
Manfield's example deal:
- "Even though your hand might be quite distributional, the opponents' hands are often much more balanced. Therefore, you will frequently have more winners against their contract than you might suspect.
- "Partner might have minor honors in the opponents' suits. It is difficult to envisage the defensive power of stray Queens, Jacks and Tens. However, such cards can often help defeat the opponents' five level contract. Other times your five level bid will not fare well because the opponents have minor honors in your suits.
- "In defending high level contracts there are relatively few combinations of cards that need to be considered. Therefore, defenders are much less likely to err against five level contracts than they are to err against lower contracts.
- "Unless the deal is a distributional freak, the combined trick taking potential of the hands (i.e. - the number of tricks you can take in your best trump suit added to the number that the opponents can take in theirs) seldom exceeds 20. Therefore, even if your five over five bid works out well, your profit will tend to be small. For example, suppose the opponents bid 5 6 with both sides vulnerable, and you successfully save in 5 4. If 5 makes, and you go two down doubled, your gain will be only 100 points (-500 versus -600).
- "The combined trick taking potential of the hands is often 19 or less. In these cases five over five bids are often disastrous."
| Both vul. | North | |||
| Dlr: South | Q83 | |||
| A74 | ||||
| West |  987 | East | ||
| J97 |  JT32 | K64 | ||
| 9 | 83 | |||
| AKJT63 | South | Q42 | ||
| KQ6 | AT52 | A9854 | ||
| KQJT652 | ||||
| 5 | ||||
| 7 |
|
West 2 5 Dbl |
North 2 Pass All Pass |
East 3 Pass |
South 1 4 5 |
In contrast, the following deal from the 2011 Venice Cup exemplifies the value of extra distribution at the five-level. Sitting South was American expert Lynn Deas, representing USA 1 against USA 2.
| E-W vul. | Palmer | |||
| Dlr: East | AQJ3 | |||
| J87 | ||||
| Rosenberg | K432 | Seamon-Molson | ||
| 9 | T4 | T2 | ||
| AKQT9432 | 65 | |||
| T5 | Deas | Q986 | ||
| Q5 | K87654 | AKJ86 | ||
| -- | ||||
| AJ7 | ||||
| 9732 |
|
Rosenberg 3 Pass 5 Pass |
Palmer Pass 4 Pass Pass |
Seamon-Molson Pass 4 Dbl Pass Dbl |
Deas 2 Pass Pass 5 All pass |
, East-West found their optimal ...,