So far we are staving off Ireland at the bottom of the pack. Can we gain anything against Greece? At the start of each match it's 10-10 in Victory Points, then as the results start coming in we drop down towards 20-0. If we still have any victory points at the end of the match that's a win.
All the players are coping well with the formalities of playing high-level bridge. One asked me "what do you do if you can't remember which hand you're in?" You're not allowed to turn over your previous card to have a look. I asked a tournament director and was advised "It's no big deal, just ask the table." I recommended that you ask in a checking way, as in "I'm in dummy aren't I?".
We had one funny situation where a director came to one of our tables to ask for play to be speeded up. What was happening was at the end of each trick everyone was keeping their cards face-up on display for a really long time, thinking that the other players still wanted to see them. No one wanted to be rude and turn their card over first. That's now resolved (you turn your card over straight away, if anyone wants to see your card they will ask, as long as they've not turned theirs over yet).
Our players are currently two rooms away half-way through the match and it's 15-5 to Greece. How will we cope with this board?
On most tables North opened 2NT and South bid 3NT. Assuming East leads a Spade, you have two Spade tricks, four Hearts (maybe), two Diamonds and a Club. That makes nine, but you have to get them in the right order. If you lose the lead too often and they play Spades enough you will be defeated.
On the Jack of Spades lead the winning play is a low Spade from dummy. This looks odd, as it means you have to lose an un-necessary trick to the King, but means you can duck one more round of Spades. Then you have to knock out the King of Diamonds while you still have Spades stopped - if you play on Hearts first West will win, clear Spades, then when East gets in later you are defeated.
I don't know if there's any reason to play on Diamonds before Hearts, it's just what works here as East's entry is in Diamonds not Hearts.
In our match the Greek declarer was in 3NT. Donald as East tried a Diamond, which didn't work well and declarer wrapped up 10 tricks.
On the other table we found the 4H fit with an unusual auction, and the defence found the ruffs to beat it by four.
Here is another challenging hand:
When we had the cards East (Donald) opened 1H. West (Michael) replied 2S, which for us is strong and forcing. Donald rebid 3H, Michael 3S, then Donald showed his Club stop with 3NT. This was passed out and sadly we played game with 36 points.
On the other table after a similar start the Greek West did not pass 3NT, he bid 7C! I like this for the boldness. You know your partner has a Club stop for his 3NT bid, which must be the King, plus he is big favourite to have the other two Aces. 7C makes on a 4-3 fit, though in fact with 13 top tricks (at least) 7NT is fine too.
After losing a couple more game swings we played well in the second half, losing by 55-19 IMPs
Round 4 Victory Points: 2.71
Total so far: 8.32 VPs (17th place)
Whereas Donald & Michael were our top pair yesterday, and Lydia & Jack did really well this morning, this was a great match for Jamie and Tamsin. Highlight Tamsin making 3Sx, but better than that unusual result is generally solid pair. When will it be my time to shine? (Answer: pub quiz tonight).
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