2022 Peggy Bayer Home Internationals #2

It looks like we finished 3rd, well behind Ireland in the end. 

Peggy Bayer Results

Today we overbid a bit and got doubled against England, then underbid a bit, then got it about right, bidding a lot on distributional hands only.

Before the final match I told my team there was always a slam on the last board, so Aidan had no difficulty finding the raise to 6♣ here.

South led a Diamond and that was an easy 12 tricks. It looks at first glance that on a safer lead 6♣ might fail, with both Diamond and Spade finesses offside but actually you can set up the Spades and always make it. I was impressed how quickly my team pointed that out when we were looking at the hands afterwards.

After nine rounds I'm pretty tired, so the team must be doubly so. They've played well and been a credit to Scotland. Here's 4/6 of them, with me in the corner.

2022 Peggy Bayer Home Internationals #1

This year I am the non-playing captain (NPC) of the Scotland U21 team. Over the weekend we'll play multiple matches against England, Ireland and Northern Ireland (no Wales this year). We have three pairs, and since it's all virtual this year my main job is selecting the pairs and submitting our lineups. The team are all very well organised and punctual and so from that point of view it's been very successful.

As for the bridge, we started with a 20-0 win against Northern Ireland, followed by a 0-20 reversal against England. In the crunch match against Ireland I watched some of it with my partner from the SOL league, John Faben, and his six-month old baby. This was the board that caused most discussion:

Straight away it looks like trouble, with two strong but misfitting hands. On the other table the Irish North-South bid to 3NT, which looks like a good result. With tricks all over the place even baby Xander could make this one and the Irish declarer duly wrapped up 3NT+2.

On our table North started with 1♣ then bid Spades and Spades again after the fourth-suit-forcing 2♦ bid, which I think does nicely shows this sort of 6-5 hand. After that South has a problem. He went for 4NT, which is presumably Blackwood, in Spades? (It wasn't alerted and I haven't asked him).

North showed one keycard and South signed off in 5♥, and who knows what's happening now. Anyway they got to 6♥ which is a playable spot.

With the trumps and Clubs behaving nicely it can make, but could also be very awkward too.

Not wanting to lead away from any honours, West started with a trump. East did well to withhold the Queen, letting the ♥T in dummy win. Declarer is now home by drawing trumps and giving up a Spade. He did well to start immediately with a Spade from dummy (East might just play low with the Ace). When West won and returned a Diamond it was all over. Declarer drew trumps and claimed 12 tricks.

A rather fortuitous 13 IMP gain.

It wasn't enough to stop us losing to Ireland, 58-24 for a paltry 2.69 Victory Points. I always think the Victory Point scales are much to extreme in these Junior events, where you expect a lot of swings.

After this we beat Northern Ireland again and lost to England again. In that final match we lost 66-7, for a morale boosting 0.07 VPs.

These are the standings after Day One:

Tomorrow we will try to take a little more off England, and crucially beat Ireland so we can come second overall.

Rowan vs St Mungos

This has been a relegation season for Team Rowan, finishing bottom of Division 1. For our last match Anna and I put in a good performance. With some good defence and some fortuitous overbidding I would say we were slightly above par on our table, at least until the last two boards were we missed a couple of difficult games. It helped that the speed of play was quite fast, which certainly helped my concentration.

On Board 10 I was faced with an absolute textbook hand. How do you play 3NT on the lead of the 6 of Hearts?

The first thing to note is that you don't have enough time to set up the Clubs. You have to lose the lead twice, which means they'll have knocked out your Ace-King of Hearts. You will then lose three Hearts and two Clubs.

If Hearts are 4-4 you are OK though. I therefore ducked the first Heart. When South followed with the 4 of Hearts on the secound round it looked like Hearts were 5-3 (at least). Over to Spades then. I unblocked the Diamonds (perhaps a mistake) and played a Spade to the Ace then a low Spade. I planned to duck this, but North popped up with the Jack. I can now establish a Spade trick by force, but never get to it, as I have no more entries to hand. So I had to duck this Spade. This so confused South he overtook with the ♠Q and I fortuitiously had nine tricks.

The best line in thie Spade suit in isolation is to play the Ace-King. This gains if anyone has honour-doubleton, and I'm always OK if they are 3-3. My line appeared to give benefits when Hearts are 4-4, but actually just messed up my entries.

On the other table my counterpart Mike McGinley got it right - just winning the fist Heart with the King and playing the top Spades.

Overall we lost the match 10-6, which for the team that's bottom of the league was quite a good result.