| Board 25 N/EW |
| |||||||||
|  |
| ||||||||
|
J T 9 5
8 2
A K Q 7
AQJBrilliant defence from me here…… Our opponents had a bizarre auction to 3N (what’s wrong with 4H for goodness sake?)
1S 2H
3N end
I think. After a club lead I rather stupidly forgot to return a spade when in with the HA. Looking at the club pips, that does look a bit stupid – but the auction hadn’t precluded North from having Qx of clubs here and partner might just have had AJ98xx…. A bit far fetched though but seemed more likely to me than opening 1S on Jxxx which would be required for 4 spade tricks to be standing up. Oh well – a flat board in any case and a match-point top for our opponents!
Smith and Wilson got a bit high here and reached 5H following a strong club opening. Is there a pattern here? Unusual I’m sure for so many slam-hands to go wrong on one day isn’t it following a strong club opening? Fortunately no spade lead here so one of the spade losers went away.
Gidman and Rowland’s opponents discovered that the 6 level was a bit far even on a helpful lead. Oh dear – good job I wasn’t defending…
| Board 26 E/All |
| |||||||||
| |
| ||||||||
|
Interesting decision here. Partner opened a strong no-trump and then bid 2S over my Stayman response. What methods do you play here following a major response to Stayman to make a forcing raise in that suit. 4x looks a bit like a splinter, so I was reluctant to bid that without agreement, so instead spent some time assessing what hands partner might have to make slam a good prospect. Eventually, I decided that slam was likely to be no more than 50% and so bid a reluctant 4S. Having said that, on the DJ lead we were held to 450 so I guess that worked out well in the end. Still.. we’ve all been in worse!
Anyway – will have a think about that anyway….. I think following a major suit response to Stayman, it is a good idea to play a bid of the other major is a forcing raise with slam interest. Then you can save jumps for support with shortage (splinter).
David Southcombe found himself on lead here after an agricultural auction to 6S. The CA was an expensive one on this occasion but isn’t that dreadful… very unlucky I think. Even worse was that on the other table, Angus and Clacey did get the DJ lead when they pushed to the slam. A rare big swing out for the C team.
Williams/Wilson were a little unlucky here as they pushed to slam at 50+ down which does seem reasonable. They were even more unlucky to wrong side it and get a diamond lead.
| Board 27 S/None |
| |||||||||
| |
| ||||||||
|
Another chance missed here by me. Incredibly it was the same as on Board 22 and I got it wrong again!
On this occasion, South opened 1H and North once again found a conservative pass. Bryony balanced with 2H – again showing a strong hand with spades and a minor. South doubled and it was back to me again. This time without good defence to hearts, I thought redouble was wrong so tried 2N. North cam alive once again with 3H and that came back round to me. We can actually make 4S here but I was a bit worried by developments and so decided to sell out to 4H as I couldn’t be sure that we were beating 4H. Wet, really. At least we beat 3H although we should really have taken it two off after a signalling misunderstanding. Fortunately they just played in part-score at the other table so we got away with it.
Slater and Stephens had a good result here after overcalling 1H P 2H with 2S. Now the raise with Qx spades looks quite appealing and so they easily got to the cold 4S.
Good result here for Williams and Wilson as a preemptive raise to 3H practically forced John to bid 3S. This was raised to game and an unwise double led to 590 to the home team. There was a similar story in other matches when a good raise on Qx propelled Rowland and Gidman and Goldsmith/Percival Price to the good spade game.
| Board 28 W/NS |
| |||||||||
| |
| ||||||||
|
Another slight misunderstanding this time went a lot better than the last one! I opened a strong no-trump as West and partner bid 2H as a transfer to spades. My hand is prime for spades so I bid 3D as a maximum hand with values in diamonds. Partner now bid 4H which was rather ambiguous. I think she thought it was either a re-transfer or a mild-try with a heart control but I thought it was showing a heart singleton! It now seemed obvious to bid RKCB and when I heard about two keycards, bid slam. It isn’t a great spot! North led the four of clubs and so I won crossed to the HK (to see what was going to happen and put the ST on the table. This was covered much to my relief to the queen and ace. North played a second club which I won in hand. I now drew the trumps and noted that South had pitched two hearts. When I crossed to the HK and both followed, it seems likely that South was discarding from 5 hearts. The lead suggested that North had 4 clubs and south 3, and so that put South with a 1543 shape. I now put the DJ on the table to see what would happen. South played low reasonably smoothly so I had a choice of whether to ruff out the queen if North had Qxx or simply run it if South had Qxxx. In the end, I simply went with the odds as holding 4 diamonds, South is more likely to hold the queen and was mightily relieved when it worked. A fortunately swing in, but at least I took the best line.
John Atthey was the only other declarer in this spot for Gloucs against Smith and Wilson. Fortunately for us, he chose to ruff out the diamonds and fall back on an unlikely squeeze so that was a very welcome gain.
Chris Wilson muses that it was right to bid on here with an 11 count but not on board 16 with a 16 count following identical starts to the auction. Quite right – you might think? Well – yes and no, is my opinion. My view is that half the problem is the auction up to 4S At their table on both occasions, they had:
1S 2N
4S* ? *=extras presumably
2N is a raise to 3+, I guess. I think this pretty much emphasises why there was a difficulty here. The jump to 4S has taken up so much space that it forces you to guess. There is no way of knowing what to do. I would suggest that the key to this hand is to examine the responses to 2N to ensure that you have sufficient space to investigate slam before you get uncomfortably high. If anyone wants any advice on good methods, you probably shouldn’t go to me…. But I’m willing to offer the little I know!
| Board 29 N/All |
| |||||||||
| |
| ||||||||
|
Back to a humdrum hand here – N/S in a dull 3N making 10 tricks. NEXT.
| Board 30 E/None |
| |||||||||
| |
| ||||||||
|
Well – this is a very tricky hand to bid it seems… at least it was for our opponents. The Benji auction wasn’t pretty:
2C 2D
3C 3H
3N end
Ugh!! On the other table, Luke and Ed showed good judgement and found the cold 6N in about 6 bids for a big swing in. The south hand is easily worth a game-forcing opening and with a 55 10 count with great texture in the suits, there was no chance they were missing this one.
In fact this was a desperately disappointing board for the county with both our A team pairs failing to find this and both Gloucs pairs having no difficulty. One to look at for our pairs, I think as you don’t want to miss many slams this good.
Dickinson and Southcombe found a decent sequence here:
2D-2NT-3NT-4D-6NT was our sequence. A frightening ST opening lead from the ace(!) ["strong ten" was given on the card] was the defence's chosen start, but it didn't cost. I started with cAKQ, dA, then hearts, finding RHO with four in both hearts & clubs and LHO wriggling for discards. RHO looked odds-on to have a singleton diamond, especially as LHO had not opened a weak 2S, so DJ finesse was fairly marked; as it was, they covered DJ when led so that was +990.
Yep – well done. I’ve heard about a nightmare situation from Nathan Piper though. He was playing in 6H after an uncomfortable auction. Unfortunately it was one of those days and he missed a pitch and went off (he claims that he was sure there was a revoke though). The play is quite interesting though:
I've just thought.
“AH, QH, AC, ruff a club. If trumps were 5-1 or clubs 6-0 then I'm off, but if clubs were 42 or better I claim. If LHO had 5C I have a showup squeeze to pick up the diamonds whenever it's possible to do so. If RHO had 5C then if LHO had a side-suit of H in his Lucas 2 (which was possible) then I have a trump squeeze against RHO and if LHO's suit was diamonds then the diamond finesse it at least 2 to 1 on. This is all vastly better than my actual line which only gains when trumps are 5-1 and the diamond finesse works.”
Yep – I’m sure that’s what goes through my mind when I’m declaring too
Smith and Wilson had some more strong club difficulties here: “
P 1C P 1H
1S 1N 3S X* * 0-2 controls
P 4H AP
The 3S bid made it very hard for me and my doubleton S didn't look good ... I can't even be sure 4H is making! Maybe I should try 4C but I'm still not sure we're getting there. 11 IMPs out. Rats.”
Hm – I don’t know what to suggest here but it looks to me like responder needs to do more here. The problem with the hand is that the strong club opener hasn’t really shown the extra strength here. Is 1N enough? Questions, questions…..
| Board 31 S/NS |
| |||||||||
| |
| ||||||||
|
Another bidding nightmare here for our opponents. Those of a nervous disposition avert your eyes!
2D* 3D
3S 4C
4H 4N
5H 6S
I think was the auction – I have no idea what it all meant but 6S was a dismal spot. Bryony correctly declined to double despite holding 2 trump tricks as she had no way of knowing that 6N was also hopeless. If she’s known I had an ace and two kings opposite, I suspect she might have found it!
Ed and Luke had a more sensible auction on the other table and were very unlucky to find that 4S can’t make. Still a few imps in there for better judgement.
Best effort of the day came yet again from Dickinson and Southcombe:
“A nice one for the 2NT opening bid! (both minors weak). I simply raised to 3NT and there we played. We rather got away with this though: heart lead went to the king. SAKQ found the 5-2 break, so David now cashed DA and followed with C7 off dummy to ten, king. Club back to queen, jack, small.
Only hope now is a miracle endplay on West, if he started with four hearts + DK. Even then they have to fail to unblock hearts. So David now led HQ to the ace. West cashed dK (third defensive trick) and ... returned h6!! Terrible: he has an exact count at this point and knows his pard has H9 + SJ waiting for one off. HJ, H2 put West back in with H10 and he had only C/D to lead ... +600!
Phew! Well done anyway!
Unbelievably Smith and Wilson had more difficulties following a strong club opening after some seriously “robust” pre-empting – over to Nick “
P P 1C 2H!* * both majors!
3D 4H X P
??
Alan's X of 4H is pen-oriented but could be practically anything. I don't think pass is a realistic option on my hand - the choice (I felt) lay between 5C and 6C. As 5C would just suggest 5-5 (and I'm a passed hand), pard would be unlikely to raise. Pard doesn't have to have 15 pts in the majors on that auction! So, after much thought, I bid 6C - well, at least I was getting my shape across! Butland doubled briskly and Alan, perhaps reasonably (?), removed to 6N which I knew was unlikely to have much play. It wasn't doubled and went just one off, meaning that 5C would have made on the nail after all - ugh!”
| Board 32W/EW |
| |||||||||
| |
| ||||||||
|
Our opponents got to a mystifying 2N here when Bryony’s aggressive (and flat!) takeout double persuaded them not to introduce their spades. This can be defeated but it is pretty hard for partner to read me for 3 hearts when in with the SA quite early. Still – with Ed showing good technique in 4S on the other table of our mini-match this was a satisfying swing in.
In one of the A team mini-matches, both declarers lost control when trying for a cross-ruff. I must admit, I’ve not analysed this yet sufficiently to tell whether it should make or not….. sorry! Still, some made, some didn’t so well done to Piper and Robinson for rolling that one in.
Many thanks to those who gave me loads of comments on the hands. Thanks particularly to Nick Smith, Alastair Gidman, Tim Dickinson, Malcolm Currie, John Williams, Chris Wilson and John Slater for loads and loads of good stuff.
Chris Cooper June 1st 2008.
No comments:
Post a Comment