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Last Day Disappointment.

The last day, the last two rounds, in such lengthy round-robins inevitably produce success for some, great disappointment for others. It would be nice to be able to report the former for our Open Team. Alas, no.

The statistics show that they needed around 16 vps from their last two matches to qualify, basically 2 small losses or one decent win: they scored just 3.61 in total. After a week of matching it with the best, they fell short when it mattered. At least, ultimately, it was not the case of losing out by one unlucky board, though good fortune seemed to desert them when it mattered most.

New Zealand Results
Open			imps		vps		position
Canada			28-71		1.06		10
Netherlands			32-67		2.55		11
Women
Barbados			36-47		6.96		15
South Africa			26-50		4.26		17
Mixed
Italy			34-26		12.29		19
Argentina			32-22		12.8		20

 

The big win over New Zealand also left Netherlands 4 vps short of qualifying while India had the misfortune to play high-flying Norway in the last round falling out of the top 8 after drawing blank in their match.

1	NORWAY	321.3
2	SWITZERLAND	307.19
3	USA2	290.51
4	POLAND	289.9
5	ISRAEL	289.65
6	ITALY	276.15
7	CHINA	272.65
8	USA1	269.44
9	NETHERLANDS	265.11
10	INDIA	263.12
11	NEW ZEALAND	257.2
12	BELGIUM	247.3

USA1,who scored only 6.48 vps in the last round against Egypt, would have breathed a big sigh of relief as the other results went their way.

   

not the finish either Michael Cornell or Michael Whibley wanted

More disappointment for our Women with two poor results on the last day. Pamela Nisbet’s Canada also tasted disappointment at the end losing their last two matches after being in the top 8 for several rounds before that.

The only happy note for Kiwis came with our Mixed Team recording two wins against teams vying to qualify. Despite their loss to the Kiwis, India made it though a last board swing to the Kiwis eliminated Argentina: it hurts.  

That it was not going to be New Zealand’s day was evidenced by this deal against Canada:

Probably as a result of a super weak Weak 2 opening from North, Ashley Bach and Michael Cornell powered themselves all the way to 7NT played by Ashley, East. 2 lead gave Ashley the spade finesse which he knew was working but was rather irrelevant. He had to take the club finesse and had 14 tricks when the suit broke 3-3.

Good news? Certainly. 13 imps in? No. The Canadians bid to 7 and reduced the potential gain to just 2 imps. Only 1 of the other 22 tables bid to the poor grand-slam.

New Zealand actually led this match 15-13 after 10 boards. The last 6 boards were all double figure swings with 5 of them going to Canada. 3 of the Canadian swings saw slam bid at just one table.

Here’s another example of the way the matches went:

 

Whibley-Brown seemed to have quite a good result from this board when the Dutch East-West went three down in 4. Some very good guessing by the declarer could have seen this contract succeed.

However, Mayer-Ware were faced with an awkward problem at the other table where the Dutch South was declarer in 4x. This contract can be beaten but it looks like to do so, the defence must attack hearts forcing declarer to ruff twice in the South hand. If that happens, the defence will take one trick in each suit as the K does become a trick.

Unfortunately, not unreasonably, Michael Ware started with K. It looks like a heart switch and continuation is still good enough but did not happen. South was able to take advantage of the hugely fortunate lie in both black suits to come to 10 tricks and gain 12 imps for his side.

Let’s conclude on a happier note and see the board which gained our Mixed Team its victory over Argentina, their very last board of the event:

When Jenny Millington and Barry Jones were East-West, they defended 4 and took their three minor suit tricks along with a trump trick for a comfortable down 1. At the other table, Clair Miao was doubled in the same contract. Lots of points and shape around the table and Clair drew the correct inference about the trump suit to come to 10 tricks.

A successful break or two like that would have seen our Open Team finish higher than 11^th place. They had been in the top 8 from Round 9 through to Round 21 and deserved better at the end.

Richard Solomon

Tomorrow, we pick up on the main event at home over the weekend, the South Island Pairs.

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