[alibodin]

I was reading on another forum Scanian raises update by Mats Nilsland which I found interesting. Thought I would read again his excellent book 5 Card Majors The Scanian Way. In my opinion it is an excellent book, two things I think are particularly good are he has a large chunk of the book on competitive bidding which I am sure David Kok would appreciate, also he covers the whys in detail which helps.

Anyway, he originally played 5542 and has changed now to 5533. He gave his reasons some being it helps in competition to know partners minor shape.

I play 5542 and Twalsh and it works well, I am about to play with another partner natural bidding and pondering 5533. To my mind the only tricky hand is 4432 which I think is about 1.8% of hands 1/12 of 24.6%. I did some research and there was a poll asking 5542 or 5533 and the majority favoured 5533, which is interesting as most if not all literature I have read on TWalsh uses 5542. Interestingly the only exception I have found is Nilsland in his book.

I suspect at the end of the day it makes very little difference or would be difficult to measure objectively which is the better method.

[DavidKok]

If the only hand that opens 1♣ on a doubleton is 4=4=3=2, you're essentially playing 5543 and should treat it as such, especially in competition.
If the only hand that opens 1♦ on a tripleton is 4=4=3=2, you're essentially playing 5543 and should treat it as such, especially in competition.
Moving that hand shape around does not change your system by enough to make any meaningful difference. If you more regularly open 1♦ on 3 (e.g. with 3-3 in the minors), or 1♣ on 2 (e.g. with 4-2 in the minors), that's when it becomes important to start paying attention.

[awm]

I think it's fairly common that you get a hand like this as responder:

♠42
♥53
♦AT954
♣KJ84

Partner opens 1♣ and RHO overcalls 1♠. Do you have a bid on this hand? Passing here seems like a losing option; opponents will (fairly often) raise and partner (likely with 2-3 spades) will have trouble figuring out whether to act. If 1♣ could be two, I guess you can raise and pray to avoid the 4-2 fit, but this will occasionally bite you quite badly.

If you actually open 1♣ on all balanced hands (a popular modern style), I think you need to make sure to have a bid on this type of pattern (maybe transfer advances at the two-level or negative free bids, since you know opener is balanced with very high frequency, or maybe 2♣ as "both minors" or something). This is workable but requires more complexity (as with most things when you play an artificial opening that includes more hand types than the "natural" call).

[AL78]

awm, on 2025-November-12, 02:13, said:

I think it's fairly common that you get a hand like this as responder:

♠42
♥53
♦AT954
♣KJ84

Partner opens 1♣ and RHO overcalls 1♠. Do you have a bid on this hand? Passing here seems like a losing option; opponents will (fairly often) raise and partner (likely with 2-3 spades) will have trouble figuring out whether to act. If 1♣ could be two, I guess you can raise and pray to avoid the 4-2 fit, but this will occasionally bite you quite badly.

If you actually open 1♣ on all balanced hands (a popular modern style), I think you need to make sure to have a bid on this type of pattern (maybe transfer advances at the two-level or negative free bids, since you know opener is balanced with very high frequency, or maybe 2♣ as "both minors" or something). This is workable but requires more complexity (as with most things when you play an artificial opening that includes more hand types than the "natural" call).

If 1♣ is 3+ I raise to 2♣ on the basis that it is going to be a 4+ card suit more often than not. If 1♣ can be a two card suit but only with a 4432 shape outside the NT range, I take the same action, although you have to discuss it, as one partner I used to play with played 1♣ (2+) - (P) - 2♣ as basically equivalent to an Acol or Std American 2/1 bid showing a good 9+ with 4+ clubs (i.e. equivalent to 1♠ - (P) - 2♣).

[alibodin]

AL78, on 2025-November-12, 07:51, said:

If 1♣ is 3+ I raise to 2♣ on the basis that it is going to be a 4+ card suit more often than not. If 1♣ can be a two card suit but only with a 4432 shape outside the NT range, I take the same action, although you have to discuss it, as one partner I used to play with played 1♣ (2+) - (P) - 2♣ as basically equivalent to an Acol or Std American 2/1 bid showing a good 9+ with 4+ clubs (i.e. equivalent to 1♠ - (P) - 2♣).

Thanks for the replies I like David's comment "essentially playing 5543". With my TWalsh partner will stick with 5542 which puts most balanced hands in 1♣ and we can use our system. For the non TWalsh partner (at the moment - we played together many tears ago and played TWalsh) will play 5533 and Walsh. With 33 in minors would open 1♣ and 44 in minors most likely 1♦ unless wanting clubs led.

[akwoo]

alibodin, on 2025-November-12, 13:00, said:

44 in minors most likely 1♦ unless wanting clubs led.

Michael Rosenberg has said that his partnerships explicitly don't have an agreement about what to open with 44 in the minors, because he thinks that knowing which one he opens with that shape is more useful to the opponents than it is to partner.

[alibodin]

akwoo, on 2025-November-12, 14:56, said:

Michael Rosenberg has said that his partnerships explicitly don't have an agreement about what to open with 44 in the minors, because he thinks that knowing which one he opens with that shape is more useful to the opponents than it is to partner.

I am sure that is an excellent plan at his exalted levels, at my local club and online games I am sure very few would draw any inferences from openings

[pescetom]

DavidKok, on 2025-November-11, 15:52, said:

If the only hand that opens 1♣ on a doubleton is 4=4=3=2, you're essentially playing 5543 and should treat it as such, especially in competition.
If the only hand that opens 1♦ on a tripleton is 4=4=3=2, you're essentially playing 5543 and should treat it as such, especially in competition.
Moving that hand shape around does not change your system by enough to make any meaningful difference. If you more regularly open 1♦ on 3 (e.g. with 3-3 in the minors), or 1♣ on 2 (e.g. with 4-2 in the minors), that's when it becomes important to start paying attention.

You are of course right from the system point of view: but there is an important difference from a Disclosure point of view, especially if the national Alert regulations allow or even oblige you ("3+") to conflate the second scheme with the third. I have noticed some expert players in my area moving from scheme 1 to scheme 2 and I doubt that this was because they thought it was technically superior or easier to explain clearly to opponents.

akwoo, on 2025-November-12, 14:56, said:

Michael Rosenberg has said that his partnerships explicitly don't have an agreement about what to open with 44 in the minors, because he thinks that knowing which one he opens with that shape is more useful to the opponents than it is to partner.

See above about the advantage of a smoke screen here, although I know that MR is exquisitely ethical in terms of disclosure and his explicit position is technically legal.