Pre-season warm up

Last week I had the pleasure of playing bridge twice. The first was the pre-season social for the Wanderers team, who play in Division 1 of the Glasgow League. I played in a new partnership with Ronald Gaffin. We had 'the run of the cards' and did quite well.

My only regret was Board 1 with a trump suit of ♠AKTxx opposite ♠xxx. I could afford one loser and there were complications in the other suits so I thought it simplest to play the Ace-King. But in fact the winning play was to insert the Ten, which I nearly did as it just felt West might have lots of Spades.

The highlight was not bridge related, a delicious tiramisu provided by our host John DiMambro.

On Monday John and I played together at the Buchanan club. There was early excitement, as I picked pick up the monster hand of

♠AKQ642 ♥AKQJ6 ♦JT ♣-.

What do you open the bidding with? Well it doesn't matter, as partner opens ahead of you, with 1♥!

My response was rather unusual. I bid 3♠, which was correctly alerted as a splinter. I'd mis-sorted my hand, leaving one Spade on it's own. I saw that singleton Spade and bid the splinter. In the end it didn't matter, as we quickly got to 7♥ when opener showed both missing Aces.

The theme of the evening seemed to be the opponents opening with a weak bid, passed round to John who passed or doubled, leaving me with a decision. This was a tricky one for both of us:

W N E S Danny John 3♥ - - x - 3♠ - - -

West opened a strong 3♥ and I passed as North. East passed and South had a decision. John went for double. I have a good suit but was trying to do the sensible thing so went for a conservative 3♠.

East predictably lead a Heart and there was the potential for lots of tricks, or not very many if I lost trump control. I ruffed and played two top Spades and was glad to see them split 3-2. I cashed the ♣K and now have loads of Clubs winners with just one top trump outstanding. I'm pleased to say I was careful and drew that last trump to prevent them ruffing in at the right time and cutting me off from dummy.

In the end we got 3♠+2 which scored slightly above average, beating the pairs defeating 4♥ but losing to the pair in 5♣.

On my other featured board I went into a deep think about a bidding decision which in the end I never had to make:

W N E S Danny John 3♥ - - - -

As before West opened 3♥, passed round to South. I was North wondering what I would do if partner doubled. The options are 3♠, 4♠, 3NT or passing the double. In the end John passed it out and we defended 3♥-4. East informed his partner afterwards: "It's best to have two of the top three honours for a pre-empt".

+200 scored below average as several pairs were making 4♠.

In the end we finished on a decent 62%.