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Second place: no disgrace at Asia Cup.

There was to be no fairy-tale ending for our Men’s Team in the just completed Asia Cup in Jakarta though finishing second was a tremendous achievement. The 64- board final against China Hong Kong looked as it could go either way at the end of the first 16 board stanza with New Zealand winning it 32-25 and almost erasing their opponents’ 8.55 carry forward.

Second and on the left

 
Jack and Jeremy in front with Leon, Michael, Malcolm and Ashley (just) in the
rear at the medals ceremony

However, the next 2 stanzas were to be rather one-way traffic, the wrong way, as China Hong Kong won them 68-31 and 68-14 to win overall 169.55-77. The Kiwis stayed in the hunt for as long as they did when Malcolm Mayer earnt 17imps by playing for trumps 2-2 and thereby picking up the Q in 6 but there were to be many double-figure swings in the “out-column” in the last two sets.

The disappointment of those final 32 boards should not hide a superb overall performance. While Mayer-Bach and Ware-Meier played all three sets in the final and the majority of the boards in the semi-final, all three pairs had contributed hugely to the team’s success. What a great springboard for the international bridge careers of Jack James, Jeremy Fraser Hoskin and Leon Meier.

It may seem strange to highlight a board in which New Zealand lost 17 imps but it demonstrates a remarkable piece of logic from Leon. The board occurred in the final qualifying round against Chinese Taipei. Let’s look at the rather unusual situation Leon found himself in:

 

The bidding does need some explanation. 2 was natural and game-forcing. 2NT showed, or should show at least 5-5 in hearts and a minor. 3 asked for the minor.

However, there is a little “but” to that 2NT bid. Michael and Leon are not of course that experienced a partnership but they had one rather unusual agreement. An unusual jump to 5NT in such an auction says “I realise I messed up the bidding and I do not have what the system says I have shown.”

So, armed with that piece of information, what is your next bid?

I am not sure I would have found the same bid as Leon though even to bid the suit at the 6-level was extremely brave. Leon worked out that Michael could not have a minor and also could not have just hearts. There was thus only one possibility left and Leon was onto it. He chose to bid grand in his second suit… but alas the location of one key-card did not favour him.

 

It appears that there was no bid in their system to show 5-6 in the majors. When Leon bid 3, Michael realised he had shown hearts and a minor and thus bid the “I have not got my bid” 5NT.
Leon realised what had happened and worked out what Michael held. He knew Michael had a very good hand with both majors. The grand may have had a chance had the K been the K or if Michael had both kings but Leon was down to taking the losing trump finesse. That cost the Kiwis 17 imps but the match was still won and New Zealand qualified for the semi-finals. Nevertheless, a remarkably good piece of deduction.

We will look at some more from the event tomorrow.

Richard Solomon

 

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