I played in a BGB Sim pairs recently and encountered the following poor bridge. I had persuaded my partner to play four weak twos, so he had opened 2 in the second seat. Our opponent was looking at this collection in the third seat. [A hand painfully close to containing the magical 9 8 6 5 4 holding! —Ed]

What would you do? Would you bid 2NT with three stoppers, or settle for the diamond overcall? So obviously it was passed, and passed out — I looking strangely around the table with this collection:

The full deal was:

So they had conveniently missed 6 and 3NT to defend our 2! Never mind. Look at that East hand again. With the K onside, you would expect to beat 2 by at least one trick. And, just in case the outside tricks run away, we should immediately cash them. Of course we should always be looking for a ruff too. So cash three non-trump winners, and continue with a spade. Declarer wins in the dummy, and pitches a diamond on the Q, which you of course ruff. Now you give a spade ruff to partner. Up to five tricks! So now, worried that your Q might go away otherwise, when your partner returns a diamond you ruff it. Of course that gives us the contract (after the two tricks are transfered), and we had an unlikely +90. It wasn't a worldwide top, there were 3 +100s, 1 +150 and 1 +170 (!). Still a 99% is a good result. And I think that counts for poorbridge!