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Lyon – Day 3.

Life in the nervy 5 level....a hand with 2 x 6 card suits....and some more freaky slams. Some good news....and less good news re our three teams in France.

Open                                                                     Women                                               Seniors

                                      NZ score                                       NZ score                                                NZ score

Guadeloupe	41-16	15.92	Poland	39-52	6.48	Austria	37-33	11.20
India	0-33	2.83	Chinese Taipei	22-21	10.31	Japan	30-35	8.52
South Africa	18-15	10.91	England	13-47	2.69	Turkey	19-36	5.61

 

A mixed day of fortunes for our Open Team. Their victory over Guadeloupe put them for the first time where they wanted to be, in the top 8 but they then came slithering down the ladder with that bad loss to India. They dropped to 14^th but regained one place with the small win over South Africa. More importantly, they are under 6vps behind 8^th placed Australia.

Our Women remained in 17^th place all day while our Seniors hovered between 18^th and 20^th.

Round 7

A good match for our Open Team against Guadeloupe. Firstly, Ware – Tislevoll pushed their opponents to the nervy waters of the 5 level:

 

5x only costs 500 against a comfortable 620 or 650 in spades but is a big winner when 5 comes to grief. If South made a weak jump overcall in diamonds, their partner becomes favourite to have longish trumps. East must also find a place for their losing club. After the diamond lead, you can play a trump to the ace, cross to the K and then come to the moment of truth. “The pushers” were rewarded with 12 imps when the declarer misguessed. In the Women’s match, the board was played in 4 at both tables while for the Seniors, both tables were in 5, both declarers going one down.

Cornell- Bach and Christine and Jenna Gibbons both bid the following slam. Here is Michael and Ashley’s crisp auction:

 

3 was a splinter with Key Card doing the rest. 5 showed one. That was 13 imps to our Open Team though the Women needed to bid it to square the board.

Jenna and Christine’s teammates earned all the imps for their side on this freakish board:

 

How aggressive do you want to be with that North hand? South could spoil the party if they chose to open with a Weak 2 in their suit. If Susan Humphries did open, Steph Jacob was not going to be outdone as she had two 6 card suits of her own!

Susan and Steph bid all the way to 6 which West thought was a tad too high with an ace and a certain trump trick. Susan (South) got to be declarer which suggests she did not open the bidding. West led a spade but Susan could ruff out that K and concede just a trump for 12 imps in when their Polish opponents played at the 4 level. This board was the Open Teams’ only “out” in their match when Bach – Cornell doubled 5 for a 7 imp loss. Our Seniors’ lost 5 imps though neither pair played in the heart game. We will move on!

Round 8

This is not one match on which our Open Team would wish to dwell. With nothing coming in, and several small “outs”, the only big loss on a board was a difficult 3NT where the Indian declarer was more successful in finding a doubleton queen, offside, than was Matt Brown.

It looks like Shirley Newton was our hero on Board 26 of their match against Chinese Taipei.

 

East reached 3NT probably after a strong 1NT opening. Shirley, South, had to lead away from one of her honours. A heart would be disastrous. A spade (10 to avoid a blockage) would be OK but Shirley chose her diamond suit. East was in the wrong hand to take what would be a losing finesse…. and eventually the contract went 3 down vulnerable, an excellent 10 imp pick-up when Jenna and Christine Gibbons made their club partial in the other room.

 

Vivien Cornell and Shirley Newton. Good lead, Shirl.

Unfortunately, aggressive heart bidding made it difficult for Shirley and Vivien on the following:

 

It looked like East-West bid up to 4H very quickly with Vivien, North, opting to take the money. The defence can take 4 side-suit tricks and two ruffs…and still North scores the K if declarer is left stranded in dummy. However, it did not go like that with +100 being a meagre reward as compared with 6 bid and made at the other table.

Round 9.

In the Open Team’s slender win over South Africa, 13 of the 16 boards were either flat or a swing of 1 imp while one cost New Zealand 3 imps. Board 2 cost New Zealand 11 imps when it looks like the South Africans bid 3NT by South after Matthew Brown’s strong 1NT opening as West.

 

Matthew led the Date:Aug 16, 2017