One more Matchpoint Monday

For the third week in a row I've been at the Buchanan with John Di Mambro. The first week I was too timid; the second week too bold; this week about right. "Not too many regrets", I said to John afterwards. Having said that, the board below was full of rue:

W N E S Danny John - 1♦ 1♥ 2♣ 2♥ 2♠ - 4♠ - - -

I opened the West hand 1♦, North overcalled 1♥ and John bid a natural 2♣. South bid 2♥ and it was back to me. I was starting to like my hand a lot, with Kx in partner's suit and a Heart void. Rather than rebid my seven card Diamond suit I tried 2♠. John raised this to 4♠ and there I played. "Could be a Moysian fit" he warned as dummy came down, and indeed it was.

I got a trump lead from North. My plan was to play on Diamonds and hope trumps were 3-3, so I should have begun by ducking this Spade. But I didn't. Anyway with trumps 5-1 it was doomed, and while I didn't quite suffer the ignominy of having the defence draw my trumps I lost control and went three down. I think actually on this layout to make as many tricks as possible you need to ruff everything in hand, and eschew the Diamond finesse. But down one, two, or three is always going to be a bad score and so it turned out, as we collected 0% on the board.

If I bid a more normal 3♦ on the second round, or John doesn't raise Spades, it still seems likely we're going to end up in 3NT. This makes if they lead Spades (as happened on some tables) but on our table with the Heart overcall 3NT also fails. Well done to all the pairs who made it to 5♦ (eight tables out of twenty-five), making eleven or twelve tricks.

My other featured hand is the classic scenario when you've got a great hand but before you bid partner pre-empts:

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

John opened the East hand with a Weak Two, in what must be a minimum for suit quality standards. I can see nine tricks (six Diamonds and three Clubs) so just need some sort of stopper in the other suits. When South overcalled 2♥ I bid 3♥ asking for a Heart stopper (I hope). John's King is actually enough, and he might have counted it, but perhaps wisely settled for 4♦. I'm now thinking if 5♦ will have play. It will if John has the ♠A, but I decide he's not likely to have that card and pass 4♦.

South went for a slight surprise Spade lead and hit the jackpot as the defence took the first four tricks. In 3NT they would take the first five tricks, also for one off. Our 4♦-1 is worth 48%. We beat those East-West pairs making a Heart contract but lost to those East-West pairs allowed to make extra tricks in Diamonds.

Despite those setbacks we scored well on other boards and finished on 66.4%.

More Matchpoint Monday

After finishing second by a single matchpoint last week, we returned to the Buchanan Club for the Monday Matchpoint.

John was just back from playing in the National League at the weekend, and was perhaps used to a partner with slightly sharper defence. A few times he was waiting for me to give him a ruff, and is still waiting. I don't think it cost too much though, and as is often the way with matchpoints things don't always turn out like you expect. You can stumble into a bad 4♦-2, apologise to partner, then realise it's a good score as they should be making 4♠.

In the hand below John dealt and opened the North hand 1♠. East passed and I responded 2♦. All normal so far. Then West came in with 2NT. This was not alerted, but was clearly meant to be some sort of Unusual 2NT, showing 5-5 in the other suits. John bid 3♠, which must be showing a pretty good suit, so I raised to game.

W N E S John Danny - 1♠ - 2♦ 2NT* 3♠ - 4♠ - - -

East had the rare opportunity to defend game with six trumps, and wisely didn't double. If he had of doubled I would have bid 5♦ on my own as South, and made it with an overtrick.

The 6-0 trump split is unfortunate, but careful play limited the losses to minus two, scoring 28% (five of ten North-South pairs found the Diamond game).

Here is the first hand of the evening that I declared, a tricky 3NT. It was a psychological battle, as I was aware that despite a combined 27 count I ought to go down unless I can dupe the defence.

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W N E S John Danny 1♣ - 1♠ - 2NT - 3NT - - -

We play five card majors so I opened 1♣, and we quickly got to 3NT (as did all but one table, who suffered in 4♠). West lead a Heart and I had a think.

There are six top tricks, and two more can be developed in Clubs. But if the defence duck Clubs twice then they could take an extra trick there (or two). I also have the potential of a long trick in Spades. Diamonds could give me one or two extra tricks, but could also be the best suit for the defence.

I won the opening Heart lead in hand and lead a Club to the Jack. East won her Ace and played a Diamond to my Jack and West's Queen. West didn't want to continue Diamonds so seemed likely to also have the Ace, and be waiting for another Diamond through from partner. I was hoping he'd cash his Ace anyway (and present me with a ninth trick) but he wisely held off and played another Heart. My only hope for another trick now is Spades, which involves giving up one first. But I can't let East have the lead, as she can put another Diamond through (meaning I lose three Diamonds, one Club and one Spade). So I snuck a Spade through East. Thankfully, she played low and my 8 forced West to win.

I'm happy now. Even if Spade's aren't 3-3 I still have chances with a Spade endplay, if West has four. As it happened they were 3-3 and I got nine tricks. Almost every other declarer also made nine tricks (one made eight, one ten), so it was an average score, but a pleasing hand.

After that burst of concentration my head got rather cloudy, and I didn't know if I needed more coffee or less. Thankfully I was only declarer once more in the evening, and we finished on a better-than-expected 60.2%.

Matchpoint Monday

Last night I played the Buchanan Monday night Matchpoints with John Di Mambro. We did OK, finishing on 58%, just one matchpoint behind the North-South winners, Martin Bateman and Ted Black.

I was dummy a lot, but didn't mind as John was squeezing every possible trick out of NT contracts. He has admirable match-point savvy, and once even managed to steer himself into 3NT while 6-6 in the minors (and make it - Martin and ted got an overtrick). But on the hand below we both knew it was going to be a bad score:

W N E S John Danny - - 1♠ x 3♠ - 4♠ - - -

When East opened 1♠ I made a take-out double, West bid a natural 3♠ and East raised to game. I lead the ♣Q with high hopes. But declarer won the lead in hand and played the ♠A, dropping my King! Although the contract always makes, this vital overtrick gave her most of the matchpoints (one other table also somehow made 4♠+1). After the hand I asked declarer why they had played trumps that way - had I given something away with my body language? Declarer told me it was because I was known to have most of the points (true) and there weren't many entries to dummy (false).

Martin and Ted held it to 4♠ for 67%.

Soon after, I got to play my first hand of the evening, as we navigated to a dicy 6♥. At the end of the auction West thought for a while, doubled, then cashed his two aces. I carefully took the rest of the tricks for 0% anyway.

In the next one I may have overbid slightly:

W N E S John Danny - 1♣ 1♠ 2♣ x - 3♥ - - -

East opened 1♣ and I overcalled 1♠, planning to double later. West supported Clubs and John doubled, perhaps afraid 2♣ would be passed out. I have a good hand now. I'd like to bid 3♣, letting John choose the contract, but was too afraid he'd bid 3NT so just jumped to 3♥. Everyone was happy to let me play this and passed.

On the lead of a low Club I tried the ♣J which lost to the ♣Q and I ruffed. Things look bleak. I don't have many losers but am destined to quickly lose trump control. A cross-ruff would only get me to seven tricks, but being vulnerable, two off is no good. I need more tricks, but there's no way I can draw trump and make anything out of the Diamonds.

I did a bit of ruffing, drew trumps keeping one master, and set up the Diamonds. When I played winning Diamonds through East he was reluctant to ruff, and I started accumulating more tricks than expected. I now had a cunning plan to endplay him to lead away from the ♣A and give me my eighth trick. At the end I sighed "one off" but apparently I had nine tricks for 3♥=. A lot of work and some luck for 50%. A Diamond contract is much easier, and of course Martin and Ted made 5♦.

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

This last one shows how tough Matchpoint can be. I opened a Weak Two and John bid a 2NT enquiry. I bid 3♦ showing a singleton or void and he leapt to 4♠. I'm not sure what he would have bid if I'd have given a different response (perhaps 3NT?).

There are three top losers and the defence duly took them. Because East knew I had a singleton Diamond it was easy for him to cash the ♦A, without waiting to try and get a Diamond through from partner.

Our par score of 4♠= was worth just 8%, as nearly all the other declarers got overticks. Martin and Ted managed a remarkable 4♠+2, on a low Diamond lead from West. I can only assume that East was allowed to win the ♦J, then tried to cash the ♦A and declarer had the rest.

Wanderers vs Lyndoch

After last week's warm up at Buchanan Martin and I took to the table again for a Glasgow League match against Lyndoch. This being our third time playing together we had developed a reasonable system of 15-17 NT, 5 card majors, Puppet Stayman, basically everything I'm unfamiliar with.

On the first few hands I felt very warm but also shaking with the cold and made repeated pre-empts. At one point, when asked, Martin said "he's probably got a reasonable hand as he's vulnerable". But I didn't have a reasonable hand at all.

When I was dealer with the West hand below I was also vulnerable and a little too weak, but weighed in anyway. The auction is best done as a description: they competed to 3♦ and Martin doubled. I trusted that after my pre-empt his double was penalties and passed. They ran to 3♥ and he doubled, they tried 3♠ and he doubled, and were finally back in 4♦. At this point I doubled as Martin had run out of double cards, and by now I was feeling pretty confident it was going down.

W N E S Danny N Martin S 3♣ x - 3♦ - - x - - 3♥ x - - 3♠ x 4♦ x - - -

I was pleased they'd finished with Diamonds as trumps, as I had a clear lead; the ♥J. Martin won two rounds of Hearts then returned the ♥2, as a signal for a Club ruff. We took the first six tricks then the ♦K to come for 4♦x-4 and +1100. In aggregate this is a huge score, and is actually one of the reasons I don't like aggregate as a few hands can dominate the scores.

Luckily our opponents were experienced enough to take this in their stride and got right back into it, beating us on a series of marginal games. Towards the end of the evening I was getting rather tired, and was quite unprepared for this big contract:

Danny N Martin S W N E S 1♦ 2♥ 6♦ - - -

I opened 1♦, which is the agreed bid in our system. This is the only distribution where I could have only three Diamonds. North made a weak jump overcall in Hearts and Martin thought for just a few seconds before popping down 6♦. North lead the ♥J and dummy came down.

This was only my second hand of the evening and I was really hoping it would be easy. But there was work to do. My hand is not very suitable, with only three Diamonds and wasted ♥AK. I have a certain loser in the trump Ace and must therefore avoid losing to the ♦J.

After a considerable pause I realised there was also no way I could get rid of all my Clubs on the Hearts, so I would need the Club finesse. Assuming the Club finesse was working, and considering North's pre-empt, South was likely to have long Diamonds. So, I won the Heart lead in hand and crossed to dummy with a Spade, then followed my instinct by leading a Diamond to the Nine. This heldm and after that everything fell into place. After a few more long pauses, 6♦ was home.

In the end we won the match 9-7.

Matchpoints with Martin

As a warm up to next week's ur league match Martin Bateman and I played Matchpoint Monday at the Buchanan Bridge Club. It was a good night and we finished on about 56%.

I've two regrets. The first was not entering the score for the last two boards, which were therefore recorded as 'not played' and both pairs got 40%. This is particularly harsh on our opponents, for which they were two good boards. The three previous boards, which I did remember to score, were good for us. In my defence it was the end of the evening and I was tired.

My other regret is letting through this doubled contract. This is one of those where from declarer's perspective you can't believe your luck as you sit there and the defence do everything they can to help you. It was a debacle:

W N E S Martin Danny - 1♠ 3♣ 3♠ 4♣ - - x - 4♠ - - 5♣ x - - - -

South took a conservative view and passed her 12 count. West was less conservative and opened 1♠. I was sat East trying to remember the Bergen responses when North saved me by bidding a textbook 3♣. I settled for 3♠ and when 4♣ came back to me decided to double, based on my partner's opening bid and my ♥AK. Martin put us back to 4♠ but when they ended up in 5♣x I thought we'd done very well.

I was expecting us to take at least two Hearts and a Spade. I lead the ♥A for attitude, then immediately wished I'd lead the ♥K for count, as I didn't know whether another Heart was cashing. I switched to Spades, and here comes my second blunder. I boldly lead the ♠Q, to make it easier for partner if he had the suspected ♠AJ. Of course declarer covered with the King, promoting the Jack in his hand, and Martin then returned a Spade suspecting it was me who had lead from ♠QJ. A ruffing finesse in Diamonds later and declarer had 11 tricks and 100% of the matchpoints.

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%.

Sole Bay & Halewsorth

This last week Anna and I were lucky enough to play at two different bridge clubs. The first was a return to the Sole Bay Bridge Club in Southwold, where we'd last visited in 2016.

We arrived promptly for the Wednesday evening game and made up an extra half table. Anna warned me "It's a while since I've played" but actually it went pretty smoothly. I bid a bold slam early on then got a bit lucky on the deal below.

No one is vulnerable, East deals:

♠ A K Q ♥ x x ♦ x x x x ♣ K x x x ♠ x ♥ K Q T x ♦ A K Q x ♣ A J x x 12 19 6 3 ♠ T x x ♥ A x ♦ T x x x ♣ Q x x x ♠ J x x x x x ♥ J x x x x ♦ J ♣ x

W N E S Anna Danny - - 1♥ - - 1♠ - - -

I picked up the weak South hand with 6-5 in the majors. I decided that if East opened I'd make a Michaels Cue Bid, as that was the one thing we'd discussed on the walk over. But when East passed I decided I couldn't really open a Weak Two, so passed. West opened 1♥ which came round to me. I should maybe pass, as I have five trumps in defence, but I felt like bidding so bid 1♠.

West thought for a bit then passed (they played penalty doubles so she couldn't double for takeout), and Anna sitting North made a disciplined pass with her excellent trump support.

Wehn dummy came down I realised I'd hit the jackpot; there should be six trumps and assuming the ♣K was onside that would make the seven tricks I needed. In fact I made nine, with a Heart ruff and the ♥J becoming high leading to 90% for 1♠+2. A couple of East-West pairs made a very dubious 3NT;, which makes as the Spades are blocked.

We finished with two bad boards (Doug making 3NT+3 against us, twice), but did enough to finish 1st with 65%.

The next Friday we went to the afternoon session at Halesworth Bridge Club. It was a friendly informal atmosphere which perhaps lulled us from maximum sharpness. This time we finished 3rd with 59%. Featured below is an early setback where, unusually, both Anna and I undervalued our hands and missed the game.

No one vulnerable, South deals:

♠ A T 7 3 ♥ T 9 7 6 4 3 ♦ K 6 ♣ 6 ♠ J 8 4 2 ♥ Q 5 ♦ T 9 8 7 ♣ J 9 5 7 4 16 13 ♠ Q 9 6 ♥ - ♦ A Q J 4 2 ♣ A K T 4 3 ♠ K 5 ♥ A K J 8 2 ♦ 4 3 ♣ Q 8 7 2

W N E S Danny Anna 1NT - 2♣* 3♣ 3♥ - - -

Anna chose to open the South hand 1NT, which sometimes works well but backfired here. I had the weak North hand and bid 2♣ as a weak version of Stayman, intending to correct a 2♦ response to 2♥. East thought for a while then bid 3♣, over which Anna bid 3♥. I re-evaluated as North. Only seven points, but with partner having four Hearts and opponents bidding Clubs it looks pretty good, so maybe I should have bid 4♥. But my general strategy was not to bid marginal games so I passed out 3♥, which of course made 10 tricks.

Turns out the rest of the field didn't think it was such a marginal game. Almost all of them got to 4♥, so 3♥+1 was worth only 17%.

At the break we had a cracking cup of tea and Anna took the chocolate Hob-Nob and fig roll.