All bridge writers make mistakes. But they should work hard to give sound advice to their readers, especially in the bidding.

Look at the North hand in today's diagram. You open one spade, and your partner responds two diamonds. What would you rebid?

There is an excellent general rule in bidding: Never immediately rebid in a suit, whether a major or a minor, unless you have at least six cards in that suit.

Here, North has an easy two-no-trump rebid. But the columnist who gave this hand had North rebid two spades without one word of comment. In my opinion, even three diamonds is a better rebid than two spades.

If you put the North hand opposite my hypothesized South hand, you will see that six diamonds is the best spot. It requires little more than one of two finesses, and makes here. After North rebids two no-trump, a possible sequence is three clubs - three diamonds - three spades - four hearts (a control-bid; North's hand could hardly be better) - six diamonds - pass.

If North rebids two spades, South might well jump straight to four spades. But what happens to six spades?

East leads the heart king, which kills the contract. Probably North would win with his ace, play a club to the ace, and run the spade jack. East calmly ducks. And now, when declarer repeats the spade finesse, he goes down two, losing one spade and two hearts.

Occasionally, you will have to rebid immediately in a five-card suit, but then every other alternative must be worse.

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