Connections Cup #2

Phil Moon and I were back at the Buchanan for an online game yesterday.

We made a promising start, when Phil made an excellent 4♥ overcall, causing them to miss their Diamond slam. Unfortunately the same thing happened at the other table so it was flat.

In fact, over 16 boards there was only one game swing. And it was against us, caused by my dubious bidding:

Phil opened 1♥ and it was over to me. We play four card majors and weak NT. We've not discussed what suit to open with a four card minor and a four card major, but I do know that Phil either has five Hearts or 15+ points.

I made the unusual response of 2♥. As it happens, my wife was walking past at that time and after my bid I asked what she would have done. "1NT" she said straight away. I wish I had. 2♥ could have worked well, if for example we end up playing 2♥ instead of 1NT. I've a singleton Spade and partner is likely short of Spades. If Phil does bid on, it's very likely he has five Hearts.

As it is, Phil has a balanced 19 count with only four Hearts (and four good Spades). At least his Hearts are good, and 4♥ has some play.

On the ♣Q lead Phil let it run round to his ♣A, leaving the finesse for later. He now has plenty of tricks, the only problem is trump losers. Phil found a good line of ducking a Heart, leading small from hand. Unfortunately the defence pounced on this, and found a way to beat the contract. South won the ♥Q and lead a Diamond through, North won ♦AQ then a fourth Diamond puts declarer in big trouble. He's already lost three tricks so ruffs high with the ♥K and can no longer make it.

The other table had a more usual auction to 3NT. This has eight top tricks, and chances for a ninth (and tenth) in Hearts, Clubs and Diamonds. When it made exactly that was 10 IMPs away.

In the end we lost 19-24.

Textbook

I sometimes look at bridge problems in a magazine or newspaper. You can normally work out what the point of the problem is, and solve it. In real life it's much harder, as you're not sure if there even is a neat solution.

Last week though, in a friendly match on Bridge Base, I actually had one of these textbook hands come up. There was one and only chance to make it, which I had to play for:

Anna had the East hand and opened. A bit light, but with good Clubs. I was East and was also a bit light when I raised to game, but was hoping to find six Clubs in dummy. Against 3NT North lead a low Diamond.

We've only 23 points, but it's got play. I've got five Club tricks (assuming they split), one Heart, one Diamond, so need two Spades. The thing to do then is to lead up to the ♠T, and if it's onside I'll get my two spades. I recognise this, and after winning the first Diamond lead a Spade up to the ♠Q, which holds.

I now simply have to complete my plan and lead a Spade back to the ♠T, which as you can see will work. But I start to wonder if I need to do that straight away, and maybe there's the chance of a Diamond trick too. I try playing a Diamond, which is catastrophic. South wins his ♦K and accurately switches to a Heart. Now I have to lose one Heart, one Spade, and three Diamonds.

One off, when it was there for the taking.

Connections Cup #1

With the big lockdown the Buchanan Bridge Club have responded quickly and set up online matches on Monday and Wednesday. These will hopefully become tournaments at some point, but for now are a series of Teams Matches, organised by Ron Hounsell. The winner of the Connections Cup will be those who have the highest five IMP scores across the whole time that the club is closed (maybe three months, maybe six months?)

It is of course a fun and friendly tournament, and I think most people are glad just to have a bit of bridge and some sort of socialising. But I've been thinking about the scoring system, and it means you are rewarded for being in high scoring matches. A flat board is no use to either team. That's perfect for myself and my partner of last night, Phil Moon. Like me, Phil is an optimistic bidder, and he rarely misses either a slam or a sacrifice.

Our best result was on the final board, where I had a really nice hand for my pre-empt and didn't mind being doubled:

West opened 1♣ and East correctly bid 1♠, showing the major. I had the big South hand. I have the strength for 2♥ but opposite a passed partner bid an immediate 4♥. West has an easy 4♠ bid. Phil then found the winning bid of 5♥. East doubled this pretty quickly, although actually she knows about double fit and might have thought about bidding on. West thought for much longer then 5♥x was passed out.

The defence took two Spades then lead a Club ruffed in hand. From my perspective as declarer, if I can avoid any trump losers I'll make the contract. If either hand has a singleton King then laying down the ♥A works, but if it's specifically West with a singleton Jack then I need to lead the ♥Q from dummy. I considered that was more likely, so crossed to dummy to lead the Queen. You can see that on this layout it still didn't work, but still saved a trick compared to starting with the ♥A.

5♥x-1 felt like a good score. In 4♠ the defence have only two Diamond tricks, plus perhaps a Club ruff. Indeed 4♠ was left in at the other table and made, so we gained 11 IMPs.

Our other high level adventures both involved us bidding on to slam after one partner had made a natural 3NT bid. This is always tricky - is 4NT Blackwood, quantitative, or to play? In the end our 6♦ went down and our 6♠ made, for more IMPs exchanged.

The final score was a narrow win by 43 to 34.

Wanderers Team Match #2

Yesterday Ted and I had another game playing in the Wanderers Team Match. The match was due to start at seven, but unfortunately one player delayed the start by twenty minutes. He'd foolishly moved toddler bedtime back by half an hour to account for BST, and had forgotten that this would make him late for the game. On checking his phone (during a Peppa Pig omnibus book) he found many texts and missed calls, so raced through Thomas the Tank Engine and the Windy Day at double speed, put the boy down in his cot and rushed through to log on.

Thankfully, the first four boards were fairly quiet and gave me time to recover. Board 5 I had a high level decision to make, and got it very wrong:

I have a very appealing South hand, especially when partner opens a natural 1♣. Over the 1NT I blasted 4♥, then found out the 1NT was a conventional bid. Didn't matter though. When Ted competed with 5♥ I pictured him with some useful Aces and Kings, and pressed on to 6♥. As it happened, partner's hand was not the one I was hoping for. And, as he tends to do, Tam doubled me.

All three finesses lost (as you would expect from the bidding) leading to 6♥x-3. The other table also misjudged slightly to play in 5♥-1, when actually 5♦ goes down.

Later we gained some of those lost IMPs back when Ted bid 4♥ that missed at the other table, then we saw the opponents unlucky to miss out on the slam bonus with the trump suit below:

	♠ A J 2
♠ K Q 9 8 3		♠ T 7 6 5
	♠ 4

6♠ went one off. However, this was another 9 IMPs away as on the other table East-West had bid on to 7♠! North found a shrewd double and beat it by two. In fact, the 7♠ bidders were lucky 6♠ goes down too.

Next Ted and I had a misunderstanding over the meaning of a 2♣ overcall of a 1♣ opening, where the opening could be short. I wound up in 4♠ in a 3-3 fit, which actually played quite nicely for one off but still a small loss. Then we overbid to 4♠x and the opponents overbid to 6NT-1. It was not a night for aggressive bidding! We finished the first half down by 21 to 33 IMPs.

The most interesting hand in the second half came where I picked up a lovely hand, and duly overbid it to a failing slam.

After my 1♦ opening the opponents competed aggressively in Hearts;. I was happy to leave alone 4♠ but when Ted competed to 5♠ I took the plunge and bid six. I've got exactly the sort of hand that makes lots of tricks.

Throughout the auction I thought Ted had more Spades then he actually did (he's bid them three times!), and doubtless he was also rather disappointed with my dummy. If trumps are 3-3 there's actually pretty good play, if you can set up the Diamonds. Ted played it nobly, going all out for the 3-3 fit, but not to be and the result was 6♠-2. At the other table North-South got off lightly in 3♥x-2, so actually we'd have won the board playing 4♠ (or doubling 5♥).

Just for balance my final hand is one where we gained 13 IMPs. Not for doing anything clever, just getting a lucky lead.

When the ♠J held the first trick I was delighted, and 11 tricks were easy from there. At the other table West got a Heart lead, and very nearly stole the contract. He managed to sneak by a Spade to the Jack, and after that would have had nine tricks if Clubs broke.

In the end we lost the second half by 19 IMPs to 32, keeping up my 100% record of losing every stanza. Thanks to Ted for another enjoyable game and John for organisation.

Wanderers Team Match #1

All of the Bridge Clubs are closed, so it's the perfect opportunity for an online game. Last night Team Wanderers from the Glasgow League had our first online adventure, a teams match between eight of us. Hopefully we'll repeat this each Sunday, and maybe even have unofficial matches against other teams in the league.

In the first half me and Ted were up against the regular partnership of Martin and Gints. We came unstuck early on:

I sat West (dkham) with the the nice 5-5 hand and was all set to make some sort of bid when South opened one of my suits. Partner had passed, it was favourable vulnerability, and I still felt like bidding, so decided this was the time to make a five card weak jump overcall. This initially worked well as the opponents ended up in a hopeless 3NT. Unfortunately my partner expected me to have a somewhat purer hand, and bid 4♥. This was doubled, off two. At the other table West made an (also somewhat dubious) overcall of 2♥, and ending up playing 3♥-1. So that was six IMPS away.

We lost a further 11 IMPs when Martin and Gints made a slam. Then we bid one of our own - in a crowded auction partner bid 5♦ and I crossed my fingers and topped him up to six, then nervously went to put the kettle on. Luckily it worked out fine and we'd recovered slightly to finish the first half 15-18 down.

In the second half we played against Tam and John Faben. The boards were wilder here, and so was the bidding, as we were doubled four times in ten boards. This was occasionally expensive, but it worked out well for us here:

When Ted opened 1♠ I had a great hand as East and began with 2♥. South then weighed in heavily with 4NT, showing a very distributional hand with minors. North chose clubs. At this point I've a decision to make. As a partnership we (obviously) hadn't discussed what Ted's pass of 4NT meant, but I guessed (wrongly) that with defensive values he would have doublded. So I bid on to 5♥, a little worried about my doubletons in both minors but reassured by the thought that even if 5♥ went off it might be a good sacrifice. It was duly doubled.

South lead the Ten of Spades and it's one of those rare hands (rare to me) where straight away you can place all the cards and know what's going to happen. South must be at least 6-5 from the bidding and in fact must be exactly 6-5, as the lead is surely a singleton and he must have a trump if he's bothering to lead a singleton. That means that I'll be able to win the Spade, draw South's one trump, then discard my Club losers on dummy's Spades, and North won't be able to ruff in as he started with lots of Spades. That is indeed how it worked out, for 5♥x+1. It only occurred to me later that South might have just been leading a Spade as partner doubled and it was dummy's suit.

On the other table South made a more restrained 2NT overcall, then came back in with 4NT over 4♥. This got him to 5♣ doubled (likely off three with a Diamond ruff), but East bid on with 5♥ (a slam try, in their forcing pass system). The defence started well with ♣A but then switched to a Spade so that game made too.

Finally, a board with some regret attached to it, as I missed out on the game bonus:

I began with a 1♠ overcall then when partner made a modest raise settled for 3♠. This made plus one on the ♣K lead, after I was able to ruff two Hearts (but suffered a Club ruff). In fact with the friendly Spade position there are always ten tricks there, and with dummy having four trumps game is worth being in.

I was close to bidding 4♠, as I knew that partner had some spade Support and was likely short in Hearts. At the other table my counterpart East didn't have any of that information but still bid game. Their auction began with 1NT form South, passed around to East who bid 2♣ showing majors, and on seeing partner's 2♠ preference, he bid an immediate 4♠ and hit the jackpot.

In the second half my team (the felines I believe) lost by another 22, leaving the other team (canines?) 25 IMPs winners.

Overall I enjoyed playing a semi-competitive game. There was a bit of confusion about playing online, which will hopefully improve each time we do this, and with better planning I'll stop trying to make a sandwich between hands. Otherwise an excellent evening.

Dave Jolley Pairs

Last night I played with Ted Black in a Matchpoint event at the Buchanan Bridge Club. It was a handicap pairs event, which meant that after the usual scoring each pair would be adjusted based on their previously accumulated masterpoints. In fact this time the handicapping didn't make any difference, as the winning pair won by nearly 20%. ]

It wasn't us, far from it, and in fact my featured board involves scoring 0% and a call to the director:

W N E S Ted Danny 1♣ 1♦ x 2♦ - - 2♠ - 3♣ 3♦ 4♣ - - x - - -

East opened 1♣ and I had no trouble overcalling 1♦ with the South hand. West had a think then doubled showing the majors, and Ted made the obvious raise to 2♦. At this point East thought for a long time and then passed. I suppose he was thinking about either bidding Hearts or rebidding his strong Clubs. At this point I should bid 3♦ as South, to buy the contract. At the time I was well aware that I should bid 3♦, but tried to buy it on the cheap and passed. As we will see, this strategy backfired badly.

West kept going with 2♠, which East corrected back to 3♣. Now I bid the 3♦ I should have bid the round before, and West bid 4♣. I doubled, for various reasons none of which is particularly good.

I lead my Club and was briefly hopeful, but there are exactly three tricks for the defence leading to 4♣x=. The director was called at this point as East's long pause before passing 2♦ may have lead West to bid on. Is it obvious for West to compete to the four level opposite a partner who passed 2♦ with nothing to think about?

The director said he'd think about it but was later relieved of this duty as we withdrew our claim; it's a bit woolly for anything definite, though still annoying. Though perhaps it's mostly annoying as I doubled a making contract.

My second featured hand is against the runaway winners, Neil Wylie and Iain Liddell:

W N E S Danny Ted - - - 1♦ 1♥ 1♠ - 3♣ - 3NT - - -

I sat North as dealer with a poor eleven count. I decided to be prudent and pass, but then felt the need to catch up and overcall West's opening bid of 1♦. The opposition quickly got to 3NT and Ted dutifully lead my suit, kicking off with the ♥J. Needless to say, my suit was the very worst one to lead.

Dummy covered the ♥K and I took my ♥A and rapidly reassessed. It has been an evening of opponents running long suits in NT and I fully expected all six Diamonds to run - either declarer had the ♦Q or it would be finessed. Declarer also seemed to have at least three Heart tricks, bringing his total to at least nine.

So I found the bold switch of the ♠2. Declarer did the natural thing of playing the ♠J, so Ted took his Queen and returned a Spade to my Ace. It was now time for another rethink. Declarer still had all of his Diamonds and Hearts, plus maybe a Spade, so our only hope was a Club. I switched to Clubs and Ted took his Ace for the fourth and final defensive trick.

I had defended boldly and all of my assumption has been correct. For this we got another 0%.

The reason for the poor score was that the one other table in 3NT had gone down , and everywhere else East-West were playing in a part score. In fact with only 22 points between them East-West need a bit of help to make 3NT, so although we did well to take four tricks after the Heart lead, we were already doomed.

I think perhaps we were unlucky to get 0% there, but I can't really complain, as the unluckiest pair were surely Laurence & Sandy, the only ones to bid to this excellent 7♥, when everyone else, including us, stopped in 6♥:

Although seven can be made, it requires an inspired Club finesse.

In our auction I opened 1♥ and Ted splintered with 3♠. Although I later found out we had all the keycards I was cautious and stopped in 6♥, as I was worried that with all the high trumps in dummy I wouldn't be able to ruff Spades and draw trumps (which turned out to be roughly true). I was also cautious as I was a bit too tired to investigate a grand slam, and the two-board Howell movement meant we always seemed to be running late and I felt quite pressed for time.

Not long after this I hit a low point by revoking to produce a minor penalty card (the ♥5). This allowed declarer to sneak a Heart past my known King and win unjustly with his ♥Q in dummy. It was painful to see, and a good reminder of the importance of always following suit when you can.

Our score of 51% was good enough for 4th before the handicap and 6th after it.

No coffee

My favourite game with our children is to lie on the floor and pretend to be asleep. Sometimes I'm waiting for Santa to arrive, sometimes I'm just lying there. Once I actually did have a micro-nap on the playroom floor. Unfortunately, their favourite game is now to jump on top of me while I'm pretending to sleep.

Yesterday I was feeling very tired and spent a lot of the afternoon lying on the floor, getting jumped on. I knew I had bridge in the evening and was saving my energy. On previous Monday night bridge I've had a half-time Coke or strong coffee, but I've found that the caffeine, along with a good memory for all the hands I got wrong, has meant it takes hours for me to go to sleep. So this time I had no coffee, and I think the fatigue may have lead me to some odd decisions. The featured boards below show me passing out a Blackwood inquiry and claiming when I'd miscounted trumps.

W N E S Danny John 2♥ 2NT 3♥ 3♠ - 4♥ - 4♠ - 4NT* - - -

North opened a weak 2♥ and John made a natural 2NT overcall, showing 15-19 and a Heart stop. South raised to 3♥, which I would never do with a singleton Heart but certainly worked here. I was sitting West, and had a problem. All of Pass, double, 3♠ and 3NT are options. I decided on 3♠, slightly worried it would look strong (as I was an unpassed hand) as I've forced us to game.

In fact John liked his Spades so much, along with my suspected singleton or void Heart, he tried a 4♥ cuebid. I tried to put the brakes on by signing off in 4♠ but this was met with a 4NT bid. I was pretty sure this was Blackwood, but passed anyway. There's no way we were making eleven tricks but might have a chance at ten, especially with my good Heart stop, I thought.

As it happens 3NT (or 4NT) was doomed, for various reasons, but actually not the lack of Heart stops. 4NT-3 did not score well. Bidding on to 5♠ would also not have scored well either, and would probably be doubled.

Never mind, on to the next one. Nearly the end of the evening and I'm flagging slightly.

W N E S Danny John 2♥ 2♠ - 2NT - 4♠ - - -

South opened, another weak 2♥ with 6-5 shape. This one I might even have opened 3♥, at favourable vulnerability. I was sat Weat and over 2♥ I went for a modest 2♠. John replied 2NT. I considered if 3NT would have play, and thought it probably would, as there'd be time to set up my Spades. But then I came to my senses, saw my seven card Spade suit and bid 4♠. North hesitated and passed it out.

She lead the ♣A and I was glad I wasn't in 3NT, with lots of Club losers. in 4♠ I can see ten tricks: seven Spades, two Hearts and a Diamond or even two if the finesse works. I ruffed the third club, unblocked the ♠A (South threw a Diamond) and ruffed a Club back to hand. I then did what I thought was drawing trumps with the ♠KQJ, before crossing to dummy to finesse the Diamonds for an 'overtrick'. When the ♦Q held I showed my last two cards, the ♦A and ♠7.

Quick as a flash North rejected my claim, showing her ♠T and a winning Club.

At this point I actually have either nine or ten tricks. Ten if I play the ♦A first, nine if I play my Spade first. It feels normal to me to always play the ♦A first, just in case, but obviously that's not good enough and by the laws I don't have a leg to stand on. I offered to call a director, but North-South graciously refused and allowed me ten tricks.

In fact North has already gotten herself a good score by not doubling as a couple of tables played 4♠x=.

Overall we finished on 55%, which was just good enough to be the top East-West pair.