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In celebrating a great day in New Zealand’s international bridge calendar, let’s start with a sad story. Our Mixed team had started this event well but later results had been disappointing. Nevertheless, they still had a reasonable chance of making the last 16 with a couple of reasonable results on the last day. Alas, they lost 10-37 to Hungary (3.09) and then even worse, 3-69 to Turkey (0) which left them about 6 vps behind 6^th placed England with our fate totally in the hands of others as we scored 12 for the bye in the last round.

We needed 12.02! England managed 6.29 off USA which left the 16^th and 17^th places as:

England                                208.54

New Zealand                         208.53

No doubt, we could have picked up an imp or two in that Turkey mauling, let alone other matches. It is still a sad way to miss out.

At least our Seniors did not have such agonies. They missed 16^th by 64 vps! Not better but less “if onlys”! At least, they finished with a good win:

China                     11-30                     4.63

Sweden                  12-21                     7.10

Canada                 26-15                     13.45

and ended in 22^nd place in the 24 team field.

TIME TO CELEBRATE

Who says New Zealand cannot beat the poor performing countries! Our Open and Women’s teams won their two matches in style and qualified, if not easily, but with a degree of comfort in the end. The Open team played Bangladesh first up and nearly got the maximum with a 66-14 win (19.34) but there was still plenty of work to do as even though New Zealand moved up to 5^th and Canada had lost to highly placed Austria, Denmark had scored 18 and both Canada and Denmark were within 4 vps of New Zealand.

When a team plays poorly, we know who gets the blame, the coach, manager or in bridge terms, the npc. So, let’s salute the npc, Derek Evennett, who made the brave decision in sending the same four who had thrashed Bangladesh, Cornell- Bach, Whibley – Brown, “into bat” against United Arab Emirates…and the outcome?

New Zealand 74 United Arab Emirates 7 and 20 vps in the pocket. 39.34 from the last two matches. Congratulations to all the players including Michael Ware – GeO Tislevoll who will surely have plenty of work to do in the next stage. Oh, and well done to the npc too.

Time to celebrate. Come on, Matt. Are you worn out having to sit down? Nevertheless, it is your partner who has his eyes shut!

From the left, we have Derek Evennett, Michael Ware, Michael Whibley, Ashley Bach, Michael Cornell and GeO Tislevoll.

On his own (chair) is Matthew Brown.

Our Women were nearly as impressive. After beating India 45-17 (16.42), they were 7^th needing just a minimum 7vps in their last match against Palestine to be sure of qualifying. That was not in doubt as New Zealand won 53-12 (18.21) to finish a comfortable 5^th with 8 qualifying. Again, npc Kris Wooles used the same two pairs, Steph Jacob – Susan Humphries and Christine and Jenna Gibbons, in both matches. Congratulations to them and to Jenny Wilkinson and Shirley Newton. It seems Jenny incurred a fall,and ended in hospital. She is fine and rearing to get back to the table. She is made of strong stuff!

So, you want to see a little of how they did it? Some of the bridge looked “interesting”.

 

 

With Cornell- Bach staying a little conservatively in 5, everything, well 22 imps, swung on how the Bangladeshi South managed the trump suit. If West had shown a two- suited hand, then there is a good case for taking the winning line and finessing East. Fortunately, their South player did not see it that way, went one down and gave 11 imps to New Zealand.

Jenna Gibbons agreed with me and in 6 made 12 tricks. It is interesting what effect, in the other room, the double of the same contract had as the Indian declarer also went down. Maybe the double came from West?

There were slams galore in both matches played. Only a minority of North-South players bid 6 on the following deal but Cornell- Bach and Jenna and Christine Gibbons did.

 

Fortunately, they are not taught to under-lead aces against slam in the United Arab Emirates! A low heart lead would have worried Mike Cornell as North a lot more than the A he received! It was now just a simple matter of drawing trumps and discarding a diamond on the third high club. Jenna had it harder because she received the J lead from West. There was nothing for it but to draw trumps and play a heart from dummy. Whether East held her nerve and ducked giving Jenna the guess or rose, I cannot yet say. The end result was 1430 to New Zealand, 13 imps to both our teams as their opposition were only in game.

Finally, the bizarre, the miraculous…well, you need a little bit of luck along the way.

 

North-Souths either seemed to content themselves with a mundane no-trump game, a highly enjoyable very large (about 1400) penalty off West in 2x or else going down in 6. The last of those happened when Michael Whibley sat East. He doubled 6, no doubt for an unusual (spade) lead after his partner had kept very quiet during the auction. He could not be clear where the second defensive trick was coming from but that seemed to be a good start. He got the spade lead and now beat the contract with a natural diamond trick.

Who said there was a “natural diamond trick”? Jenna Gibbons got the same lead in the same contract and would either have won the return in dummy to play Q (East did not think she should cover!) or else received the 7 switch and after inserting 9, shut her eyes and found she had won the trick in dummy!

That was 16 imps to our Women when Steph Jacob found the same lead against 6 to beat the slam. Yet, what about the other table in the Open? It seems that Michael Cornell (North) became declarer in a very sporting 6NT contract. One problem was solved when he received the 10 lead. If he could play diamonds for one loser (he did…. Notice, not as good as Jenna who played them for no losers!) and the K was on-side (who says good players never take finesses!), then he would have 12 tricks. 12 tricks and 17 imps. A very good day at the office.

Good luck to both our Open and Women’s teams in the Phase of 16 over the week-end.

It is also interesting to keep tabs on our Australian cousins. Their results showed a 3-1 success. Their Mixed and Seniors teams qualified comfortably in 9^th place while their Women scraped into the 8^th and last qualifying place in their group by just 0.6 vp. However, their Open team, in finishing 9^th in their group, missed out on qualification.

Richard Solomon

 

 

 

 

 

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