In the game of bridge a balanced hand (or balanced distribution) denotes a hand containing no singleton or void and at most one doubleton. As a bridgehand contains thirteen cards, only three hand patterns can be classified as balanced: 4-3-3-3, 4-4-3-2 and 5-3-3-2. The hand patterns 5-4-2-2 and 6-3-2-2 that are generally classified as a two suiter and a single suiter respectively, are often also referred to as semi-balanced.
In natural bidding systems, balanced hands are either opened with a notrump bid, or rebid in notrump.
In the Netherlands a bidding system called Saaie klaver ("Boring club") that reserves the 1♣ opening for all balanced hands (boring hands), has gained some popularity.
Famous quotes containing the words balanced and/or hand:
“[T]hat moment of evening when the light and the darkness are so evenly balanced that the constraint of day and the suspense of night neutralize each other, leaving absolute mental liberty. It is then that the plight of being alive becomes attenuated to its least possible dimensions.”
—Thomas Hardy (1840–1928)
“With the holders holding my hand nearing the call of the bird,
Comrades mine and I in the midst, and their memory ever to keep, for the dead I loved so well,
For the sweetest, wisest soul of all my days and
lands—and this for his dear sake,
Lilac and star and bird twined with the chant of my soul,
There in the fragrant pines and the cedars dusk and dim.”
—Walt Whitman (1819–1892)