Faben vs Stevenson

This was our last match of the season, a rearragement with big implications for the league. With the Division 1 table very tight, depending on the result we would finish between third and seventh, out of ten teams.

I was well prepared for the match, as it started at 1930 and I thought 1900. The first few boards John and I got off to a great start, defeating 3NT then making our own 4♥. But as so often happens when you play good people, the exact same thing happened at the other table.

Then we got our first break, when the opponents bid to 6♠. I was feeling pretty pleased with my ♠JT63 and in fact there were more problems for declarer, and it finished two down for +11 IMPs. John and I kept a pretty good card, except for two misadventures. I pushed a bit hard resulting in 4♥-1, then we both overbid on this one:

I'm not sure why I opened the bidding. Perhaps because I was quite pleased with making a good 2♠ on the board before? I wonder if I overbid following a good result, and underbid following a bad one.

My 1♥ opening was not a success. John chose exactly the wrong moment to be optimistic and bid 2♣, which for us is game forcing. There's now no recovery, and 4♥ was the best we could hope for. We avoided 3NT with no Diamond stopper, but still had to lose three Diamonds, and when North cleverly lead a fourth round of Diamonds I was down two, losing a further two tricks in trumps.

I should say North was Liz Commins from England, and her partner was David Stevenson. This was very exciting for me, as he wrote the excellent Law & Ethics letters page in Bridge magazine, which was my favourite bit, hearing his no nonsense put-downs "I've very little sympathy for either side...".

To compound our losses on the board above our team-mates (Paul and Gints) played in 1NT by South. On their table East sensibly passed but South opened, so not a good board for opening light.

The last board of the first half was our highlight:

John's 1NT rebid shows 12-14, after which my 2♠ was natural and game forcing. After John bid 2NT I nearly signed off in 3NT, but thought I was worth one more go with 3♦. 4♦ then set Diamonds as trumps, and the redouble I think showed the Ace of Hearts. At this point I tried to sign off in 5♦, but John recognised the power of his hand (great controls) and raised me to 6♦.

I got the ♥K lead, and assessed the prospects. I have 11 top tricks (6 Diamonds, 1 Heart, 2 Clubs, 2 Spades) so need one more. This could come from a Spade ruff if trumps are 2-2, a long Spade if Spades are 3-3, a high Spade if the Queen or Jack is doubleton, or a Spade ruff even if neither trumps or Diamonds split if the hand with the long Diamond also has the long Spade. So overall, prospects were good.

I drew one trump then played two round of Spades. When North split her honours I was home, though with trumps 2-2 I'm always making. The other table played 5♦+1 so we got +11 IMPs, and ended the first half up by 22.

In the second half I confess to having something of a slump. I tried to avoid it, but it came anyway. Not sure if it's because Anna dragged me up Dumgoyne in the morning, I'd just had my second vaccination, it was getting late, or just not used to playing lots of difficult boards (probably that one). We had three boards in the middle where the opponents bid a slam, we overbid a slam, we missed a slam. An expensive trilogy. This was the opposition slam, which impressed me with the speed of the play:

After the transfer the 3♠ was a super-accept, based on three good trumps. This was enough for West to drive to slam. John found the best Spade lead, and looking at my hand I thought it might be down. I have a sure-trump trick to come, and the King of Spades too? Sadly not. Declarer rose with the Ace of Spades, played off two top trumps, then used the Diamonds to discard Spades. 6♥=.

We lost the second half of the match by 20 IMPs, to hang on for a 2 IMPs win. This gives us just enough Victory Points to vault up the table to third place, a good result seeing as we only averaged about 11/20 per game.

Congratulations to Gipson on winning the league (again?)

A couple of bodges

Anna and I played our first competitive bridge for a month or two last Monday - the 12 board EBU evening tournament. We both did very poorly. Here's two bodges from me in defence:

I've got the big West hand. I doubled, and after Anna showed Spades decided to go straight to 4♠. This was due to go one down, but quite reasonably North bid on to 5♣. I was happy doubling this.

I led my King of Spades, and Anna showed odd count. That means she has five, so I know that no more Spades are cashing. The safe thing to do would be to switch to Hearts, and set up our trick there, to go with my Spade and the Ace of Diamonds. I got greedy though, wanting two Heart tricks, and continued Spades. The danger of this soon became apparent, as declarer drew trumps and set about playing Diamonds. Luckily Anna had the ♦T, so declarer couldn't quite get all of dummy's Hearts away and it finished one off.

Anna didn't notice my bodge there, or at least didn't say anything, perhaps as we got 83% for a rare good board. This one she did notice:

Defending 1NT we get off to a good start in Spades, and all I need to do is find an entry back to Anna's hand to beat the contract comfortably. However, as declarer ran the winning Diamonds I discarded down to ♣A so couldn't get over to Anna's hand, and declarer got three more Heart tricks than he should have. I was overly focused on keeping all my Hearts to match the Heart length in dummy, but (as Anna pointed out) that was pointless anyway as my Hearts were ♥A543.

We got 7% on the board and finished with 43% overall. Luckily our season is over, and Team Rowan finished top of the second division of the Glasgow League to gain promotion for next year.

SBU Bronze League: HSOG vs Northern Lights

Last night I watched my school team playing in the SBU Bronze League. They did very well, with some excellent judgement and solid card play. What I've noticed watching them is that matches are usually won and lost by declarer play, and especially defence. More rarely, there is a chance to gain in the bidding.

This was the last board of the match:

On the first table our North opened 1♣ as we play a weak NT. East had a clear 1♠ overcall and it was over to Michael sitting South. I'd been encouraging them to "pre-empt to the max" and that's what Michael did here, with an immediate 5♣. It's the right time to do it, with a big trump fit, distributional hand, no defence and at favourable vulnerability. What makes the bid so effective though is that it's a jump all the way to game, so West doesn't know if the 5♣ is bid to make or as a sacrifice, so it's very hard for him to double. Also, Michael has pre-empted before they've found their fit, and so West is definitely going to want to show his Spade support.

Over 5♣ West really had to bid 5♠. This contract appears to have three losers (one Heart, one Diamond and one Club), but if declarer can set up the Diamonds he can throw his Heart losers. Luckily Michael found the Heart lead, and that set up three tricks for the defence and Kevin was able to cash out for minus one.

Over to the other table:

Here North chose to downgrade his 15 points and still open 1NT. Opening 1NT often makes it harder for the opponents, but here it hid North-Souths Club fit. Al overcalled 2♠ and Harry recognised the power of his hand and bid 4♠. South lead a Club to the Ace and when North returned a Heart that was exactly ten tricks too, this time for 4♠=. A good team board to gain 12 IMPs.

Overall we won the match 19-1 VPs, putting us in 3rd place in the league with one match to go. The top three get promoted, and next week we play the team in 4th.

Glasgow League: Team Rowan vs Shawlands

We managed to get the children to bed 15 minutes before the start of this match and I'm sure that helped, as Anna and I had a good game throughout. Three times we doubled them in 1NT. This was the most profitable:

Our doubles of a Weak NT are 14+, which happens quite a lot. In general I will only remove with a weak hand with a long suit. Here I am very happy to pass.

I'm not sure if East-West had a method to escape, especially as this was a double from the pass-out seat where different agreements apply. You can see that running to 2♦ would have been bad too, but not as bad as 1NT.

I led a Heart. Declarer won his ♥J in hand and started on Diamonds. They do not sit kindly. Anna won and continued Hearts. I didn't know how the Hearts were splitting, so took my ♥Q and switched to the ♣Q. This turned out to be a good switch, as it set up Anna's top Clubs.

Declarer finished with just one Spade and one Heart, for 1NTx-5 and -1100. There was the possiblity of a third trick for declarer if he'd hung on to a Club, but was forced to find a lot of discards.

On the other tables the results were 1NTx-4, 1NT-3 and North-South playing 2NT+2 when West made a surprising transfer over 1NT.

This was a hand where I could have defended better:

I led a low Heart, hoping partner had something in the suit. Anna produced the Queen which declarer won in hand and immediately led the King of Spades. I ducked, and declarer started setting up the Diamonds. My hope was that Anna had the ♥T, in which case we could get two Hearts, two Diamonds and the Ace of Spades. So I tried the Jack of Hearts, but when that didn't work out declarer actually had an overtrick for 3NT+1.

It was a mistake to duck the King of Spades. I know from the auction that Anna's ♥Q is her only high card. So if declarer has ♠KJ(x) then he always has five Spades, and the Ace-King of Hearts and Spades. That's nine tricks, with no shortage of entries to dummy.

So I might as well take my ♠A. I still have a decision to make, whether to go for the Hearts, or the Clubs. Here the ♣Q switch would work (same as it did against 1NTx in the hand above), as declarer doesn't now have the entries to set up Spades and Diamonds and goes off a lot. However, if I continue Hearts (as I probably would have) declarer still makes it comfortably, so I think I was quite far away from beating 3NT.

On the other tables East-West played 4♠-1, 3♦+1 and 3NT-2 by West, where North's Club lead makes it more difficult (declarer needs to play on Diamonds not Spades).

In the end we won our table by +3290 and the match by +3080 to win 13-3. Team Rowan are (for now at least) top of Division Two!

Faben vs Outred

John and I had quite a good game here. On Board 1 we had a mix-up defending against their Strong Club opening. I made a 'natural' 2♣ overcall, which actually showed the majors:

John's accidental psyche of 2♥ kept them out of their best fit, and left me in 2♠. It went three off. This was a good result against their making 4♥. The nice thing about playing in the SOL is that if 4♥ was making the other way you can be pretty sure our team-mates (Derek and Alex) bid it, and indeed they did.

Later I mistakenly passed John's forcing 3NT:

3NT made comfortably enough. The other table got things right in getting to 6♥, but went two off for an undeserved 11 IMP gain.

Apart from these happy accidents there was some good play and we were up at the break.

In the second half this was the most exciting board:

Over their Weak 2♦ John bid 4♦, alerted as the majors. I was on the same page here, and knew he had a big 5-5 hand. I felt quite bold jumping to 6♠, but maybe I didn't do enough. John had a think and then passed. He's got the ♠AK, and I've got the other three Aces, so it was an easy thirteen tricks and 6♠+1.

On the other table the auction started the same but Charles Outred bid 5♦ with my hand. Vi responded with 6♥ and Charles bid 7♠, making. This meant an 11 IMP loss for Team Rowan.

Overall we hung on for a narrow win.

Glasgow League: Team Rowan vs Morison

On Monday in the National League John and I had a good game, beating Team Goodman. In fact, I think more accurately our team-mates had a good game, but still it was nice to be on the winning side. I found it very challenging when Iain Sime and Brian Short were defenders, as everything seemed to go wrong for me as declarer. Tonight it was more straight forward in the Glasgow League Division Two, and we rattled through the boards with me declaring about half of them. Playing total points is also the most relaxing format, as you know that overtricks really don't matter, so lots of early claims.

Perhaps due to complacency or fatigue here's one near the end I could have done better on:

I got the obvious Diamond lead and ducked twice before winning the Ace. This was the same on all four tables. I then lead a Heart up to the Queen. West played low, but after a long enough pause to make me pretty sure he had the Ace. I cashed my four Clubs, East throwing one more Heart. I then led a Heart from dummy and the Nine appeared from East. At this point if I'm really on the ball I can work out the whole suit. I don't think West would have ducked from ♥AJx, so East must have the Jack, hence West is down to a bare Ace. Playing a low from hand should produce the Ace, and I've got 7 tricks (and luckily they can't cash out in Spades).

Of course, I did the normal thing and played the King of Hearts, reasoning I might still make my Ten of Hearts in dummy. I didn't, the defence took three Diamonds, two Spades and two Hearts for 1NT-1.

Every other table made 1NT=, after West took the Ace of Heart straight away, cashed the long Diamond, and returned a Spade, East greedily grabbing the Ace-King and giving the contract.

Despite this minor mistake we were pretty good otherwise and got a few big swings on our table, stealing a few games from our opponents. Our match (along with Colin & Sheena) finished +1580, the other table (with David & Heather and Neil & Anna) was +940. That meant a 12-4 win

SOL4: Faben vs Maiolani

We lost this match by about 12 IMPs. I think there were two boards where I gained IMPs for the team (a double of 4♠, and a risky 3♥ vulnerable overcall) but several where I lost some. This was the low point:

With a massive hand I didn't mind coming back in with 4♣. I was close to bidding 5♣, and so was John. A Spade was lead. My first thought on seeing dummy was "We've missed 5♣". I tested trumps and when they weren't 3-2 I knew what to do; set up the Diamonds straight away. However, something went wrong. I left two trumps out instead of just one, and they were the ♣QJ in West. That meant after clearing the Diamonds I couldn't draw trumps and get back to the East hand. I ended up one down.

I've looked at this hand quite a lot since. The easiest way to make it is to draw three rounds of trumps, and leave just one out. On this layout I actually do best to start on Diamonds straight away (before drawing trumps), and maybe that's what I should have done.

The other table got it right and made 3♣+2. On their table South didn't overcall at all - a missed opportunity as North-South make 4♠ I think.

My other bodge was this one:

John's double showed at least four Hearts, but that still wasn't enough to convince me to go to 5♥. You can see that I've made the right decision to defend 4♠. John led the King of Hearts, I encouraged, and he played a low Heart to my Ace. I took it as suit preference and switched to Clubs. John won and returned a Diamond. I got back in with the Ace of Spades and it was decision time. I was convinced that John had ♣AQ and that it didn't matter which minor I played. So without too much thought I played a Diamond, and now John got endplayed and declarer escaped for -2.

4♠x-2 was +300. On the other table South opened 1NT and after a 2♥ overcall North bid 2♠, East 4♥ and South had no choice really but to bid 4♠. This wasn't doubled but went three off, holding our gain to 4 IMPs. If I get the defence right instead it's +8 IMPs.