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A Great Day for the Kiwis

All went accoring to plan for those Kiwis still left in the Open Teams. Ware (Michael Ware, Nick Jacob, GeO Tislevoll, Terje Lie, Max Henbest, David Wiltshire) won both their quarter final against Van Der Vlugt (79-43.1)  and then their semi-final 76-55.1  against the up till then unbeaten Ashton (Sophie Ashton, Peter Gill, Sartaj Hans, Marty Fleischer and Andy Hung). Meanwhile Cornell (Ashley Bach, Matthew Brown, Michael Whibley, Alex Antonios and Nabil Edgtton) had the morning off as the second highest qualifier but accounted for the mainly South African Apteker (Alon and Noah Apteker, Sven-Ake Bjerregaro and Rob Stephens) 103.1-80 in the 36 board semi-final.

Both semi-finals were close with both Kiwi teams slightly behind before the third and final sets. However, Cornell won their last set 43-7 and Ware won theirs 47-24 to set up a final in which 7 of the 11 players are Kiwis.

There was more success in the Women's play-off with Sue Lusk, Viv Wood, Rachelle Pelkman and Steph Jacob beating Val Biltoft, Cynthia Belonogoff, Pauline Collett and Catherine Hood 126-96.1.

 

The Ivy Dahler Swiss Pairs is also proving a happy hunting ground as the following results indicate with three rounds to go:

		Ivy Dahler Butler Swiss Pairs
		(after 7 out of 10 rounds) -109 tables
		North-South    top 30
1st		Liz and Blair Fisher	105.93
8th		Mark Siegrist - Andrew Janisz	90.46
9th		Annette and Stephen Henry	90.44
19th		Chen Ling - Herman Yuan	82.28
23rd		Andrew Tarbutt - Alister Stuck	80.83
28th		Jane Morris - Bev Henton	78.97
30th		Leslie and Russell Watt	78.83

 

		East - West
10th		Fuxia Wen - Ian Berrington	86.96
11th		Alan Gant - Jane Lennon	86.93
12th		Barry Jones - Jenny Millington	86.57
13th		George Sun - Alice Young	86.51
19th		Margaret Perley - Paul Freeland	84.02
22nd		Noel and Claire Woodhall	82.66
24th		Murat Genc - Arleen Schwartz	80.31
26th		Michael Johnstone - Paula Gregory	80.22
27th		Gillian Gonthier- Reeve Pring	79.25
29th		Harry Shepherd - Greg Buzzard	77.97

30th		Lorraine Stachurski - Mindy Wu	77.53
		Intermediate  88 pairs   (in top 30)
3rd		Nicky Bowers - Joy Watkinson	99.19
16th		Julian and Pamela Glyn	82.17
20th		Graham Westenra - Mary Penington	80.24
24th		Jenny Carr- Kelvin Tibble	78.66
28th		Paul Maxwell - Gail Tippett	77.40
		Restricted 98 Pairs   (in top 30)
1st		Brad Tattersfield - Jan Borren	107.31
3rd		Jenni Borren - Margaret Robbie	94.43
5th		Kevin Birch - Julie Quilty	90.54
7th		Anna Chappell - Marilyn Kennedy	88.10
8th		Denise Mayhew - Dave Garrett	87.41
9th		Adrienne Dale - Miriam Lewin	87.37
12th		Barbara Imlach - Annette Martin	82.27
13th		Kaye McCreadie - Yvonne Helps	81.74
17th		Deborah Matthews - Darryl Dowthwaite	80.00
19th		Chris Glyde - Maria Casci	79.71
25th		Sue Hunt - Sue Skarupsky	78.10

Brad Tattersfield and Jan Borren have a healthy lead in the Restricted event with three rounds left.

Meanwhile, the Seres McMahon Match Point Swiss Pairs has finished with these being the top 20 Kiwi finishers(52 pairs):

6th		Jan Lenton - Lizzy Hornsey	75.98
11th		Bruce Anderson -Kathryn Tennant	72.18
16th		Alan Currie- Patrick Bugler	69.46
20th		Caroline Casely - Sam Gurney	66.80

 

A Small Inference

This board was played a couple of days earlier in Round 9 of the Teams. Many declarers failed in both 4 and 4 though not Ian Berrington. With no interference bidding, he received 2 (4^th highest leads) against his 4 game. This went to East’s queen with a low club returned to West’s ace and 10 to Ian’s king.

How would you play the trump suit for just one loser?

 

Ian had but one tiny clue. It looked like West had 4 diamonds to East’s 5. Using the Vacant Spaces theory, this meant there was just a slight inference that West held more spades than East. In that case, he must start playing trumps with the jack:

 

West did not cover. Had they done so, Ian would still have had a problem. This meant that he could lose a spade to the queen and then finesse on the second round to make his contract. The fact that a heart switch at trick 2 would have certainly set this contract takes nothing away from Ian’s good reasoning in taking the successful line.

Just another boring average!

A warning. What follows is not for the purist. If you regard yourself as one, please skip. However, if you are fun-loving, please read on...

You get exactly a 50% board from the following in Round 5 of the Seres McMahon MatchPoint Swiss Pairs. Does that mean the bidding and the final contract were very similar. What do you think?

I was South and opened a strong 1NT with:

South Deals Both Vul	N W   E S
	♠ A J ♥ J 7 ♦ A 9 7 6 3 ♣ K Q 10 8

West doubled with this being passed round to me. I was a little concerned about the majors and thus retreated 2 which might yet be better than diamonds.

West passed that but not my partner who rather surprised me by bidding 3NT! Oops, maybe I should have passed that double after all.

Yet, we were not finished yet. The up to now quiet East came in with a penalty double from my right. It was all too hard for me. I passed.

Not though West, the initial doubler. “4” said he and that was passed round yet again to me. “Trust your partner” seemed like a good motto and so my penalty double ended this crazy auction. We soon had 5 tricks and +500. 50% board. Look:

 

It seems the room was equally divided among those who made 5 and those who did not. Had I passed 1NT, the score would have been +180, still a 50% board. Had West passed 3NT x, our score would have been -500 (heart lead) and 50% less than 50% on this board.

Maybe, West should have lived by the sword on which he seemed about to die!

For the record, East-West’s double of a strong 1NT is long-suit style while against a weak no-trump, it is a more standard penalty double. Even though the strength of the 1NT was announced, East forgot their system. Had they passed 3NT or indeed West passed 1NT, they would have achieved perhaps a huge score the less dramatic way.

Richard Solomon

The final report from the Gold Coast will be on Monday and not Sunday morning.

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