Blue Club is a bridge bidding system, developed mainly by Benito Garozzo. It was used by the famous Blue Team and became very popular in 1960-1970 (nowadays being less and less used).

The main features are:

• Strong club system: 1♣ opening promises 17 or more HCP, with step answers showing controls.
• Four-card majors: 1♥ and 1♠ and 1♦ openings are limited (12-16 HCP),
• Canapé This is a powerful concept as with a 2 suited hand, your second bid is your strongest suit, whereas other more popular systems bid their weaker suit second - a potential recipe for disaster.
• 1NT ranging from 13-17 high card points. It can be either 13-15 pts which is essentially a replacement bid for a balanced club suit with 2 specific shapes, 3,3,3,4 and 3,3,2,5. 2nd is 16-17 pts and balanced.

Blue Club is a logical bidding system having been developed 40 odd years after bridge became popular and was developed as an entire concept. Other systems such as Standard American have become incredibly complicated to enable players to compete against systems such as Blue Club and Precision etc.

Blue Club is especially deadly in finding safe slams, slams that other systems miss. It is thought to be complicated and artificial but in reality is straightforward and a pleasure to play.

References

• "The Blue Club", adopted by Terence Reece ISBN 0571092659