the hog, on 2010-November-03, 18:01, said:
Disagree completely. I have analysed about 1000 hands when we played Polish C and Power. The 1D bid was a big winner.
By playing 2 or 3 cards Ds you are no longer playing Polish Club anyway.
Ok, maybe I was not clear. I only make an exception for the exact distributions of 1-4-3-5 and 4-1-3-5. So the 1
♦ opening is always unbalanced and the aforementioned distributions are the only cases it does not show at least 4 diamonds. Responder can still raise with 4crd support. So it can happen you have to play in a 4-3 fit, but with a singleton in the hand with the 3crd trumps, this is usually playable.
I agree with you that a 1
♦ opening guaranteeing a 4crd is still better, but then you will have to open 2
♣ (or 1
♣?) with these distributions. I guess you will agree with me that a 2
♣ opening always showing a 6crd is better than one showing a 5crd.