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Scott Smith, David Ackerley, Michael Ware, Matthew McManus.

“Once a Year Wonder.”

The Wellington Main Regional  Teams took place over the last weekend at the Wellington Bridge Club. As Michael Ware commented in his victory speech, tournaments at this club, organised by Club or Region are always extremely well organised, whether one talks about catering, looking after players, directing and scoring (thanks to Lorraine Stachurski and Kevin Walker) or general ambience. The deals were pretty interesting, too.

Two “complaints”. One that perhaps the number of boards (80 over 2 days) and or the number of matches (5) could have been increased a little. The other was that there were only 14 teams competing, a shame for all those who were not there.

The event was a triumph for the team of Michael Ware, Matthew McManus, Scott Smith and David Ackerley who did lose one match narrowly by 5 imps to second finishers’, Liz and Blair Fisher and Martin Reid- Peter Newell, but who blitzed their other 4 opponents scoring an average of just under 19vps per match in those 4 matches. Their victory margin was 7.92 vps with the gap between 2^nd and the third placed team of Graeme Norman- Ray Gruschow, Pat D’Arcy – Dean Sole being a massive 14.83 vps. Remember, only 5 matches. 

Of the four winners, Michael Ware plays by far the most bridge and David Ackerley by far the least. The title of this article is dedicated to him. During one of their matches, Scott Smith commented that some of their agreements were a little loose as they do not use or discuss them very often. Today’s deal, then, shows what can be achieved by a little piece of caution from David.

What say you here?

 

With a singleton spade, only a 5 card heart suit which he had already shown, a reasonable hold in the unbid suit and a useful honour in clubs, David could have been forgiven for heading off to 3NT. It seems that was the almost universal decision as 3NT was the final contract at 12 of the 14 tables, all bar one played by North.

 
David Ackerley, who plays so rarely these days.

David kept his options open. Any suit apart from diamonds might still be a playable contract. Thus, he bid a 4^th suit forcing 3 just to be sure that 3NT was the place to be. That was a very good move:

 

Even if East had not doubled, a sound action by East, Scott was not going to be owning up to a diamond hold, not even half a hold. The 3 bid would have allowed Scott to bid 3 with a doubleton, maybe honour x, or even repeat his clubs if he had held a 5-card suit. The rebid of his spade suit almost guaranteed a 6 card suit, allowing David to raise with his singleton.

All those in 3NT received a high diamond lead. Had there been an even spade break, or the J fallen in two rounds, the declarers would have made 9 comfortable tricks (by having to overtake K to ensure 9). Notice that the diamond lead takes away the option of playing for J falling in three rounds, should the spade suit not run.

Again the 3NT declarers would have survived had West held the A though this was not their day. Only one lucky declarer made their no trump game.

Meanwhile, in 4, Scott could win the 9 lead, play dummy’s top 2 hearts (yes dropping K under the ace) and discard his diamond loser. This contract was so good that Scott did not mind 4-2 breaks in both black suits. Indeed, he would have welcomed that break in spades, anticipating 3NT would have difficulties. Unfortunately for Scott, the club break was even. Why “unfortunately”? The only other pair to avoid 3NT was the North- South pair opposing Scott and David, Jeremy Fraser- Hoskin and Kevin Hu.

Jeremy and Kevin found their way to 5. Both Scott and Jeremy made 11 tricks. In 5, Jeremy needed one of the black suits to break. He and Kevin deserved that piece of good fortune in avoiding 3NT. Thus, no swing on that board, but there were plenty of other swings in David and his teammates’ favour to secure a very well deserved win.

Richard Solomon

p.s. as we only see David at the table once a year, we will feature him again tomorrow. 

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