CONTRACT BRIDGE Capacity Entry For Championship

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 31942, 20 March 1969, Page 13

CONTRACT BRIDGE Capacity Entry For Championship

(Contributed bp

J.K.W.)

Players from Napier, Wellington, Nelson, Blenheim, Motueka, Westport, Christchurch, Ashburton and Timaru provided a capacity entry for the Nelson-Marl- | borough Pairs Championship. The event was away to a lively start when the hands the players dealt for the first session were extremely freakish. On one hand, after a very competitive auction during which no mention of hearts was made, one player led his singleton heart against a contract of six clubs. His face was a study when his partner trumped the opening lead. This was another typical problem which confronted one of the participants: D—C—AKIO7S32 You are third in hand, waiting politely for the first two players to pass and wondering what to open, when your partner starts proceedings with a bid of three hearts. Your right-hand opponent overcalls three spades, and reflecting that your hand is likely to take a large number of tricks if hearts are trumps, you try to put an end to the auction by jumping straight to six 1 hearts. Your left-hand opponent of course calls six spades, and when the auction comes round again you still have a problem: ,

Without actually endorsing 1 her solution, one can admire the courage of the player 1 who when faced with this 1 situation called seven hearts i without hesitation. 1 She had three reasons. On this bidding partner might 1 have a void in spades and ’ hence no loser there. Or the 1 opponents might be double- 1 crossed into not leading a spade against a confidently I bid grand slam, for who ’ would call seven with a 1 loser in the suit most likely > to be led? Finally, it was 1 most probable that the opponents would call seven ‘ spades anyway, enabling i South to double for a reason- ■ able penalty. In the event when West ' did sacrifice, seven spades ‘ doubled was two down. Again it was proved that when faced with this sort of situation it usually pays to bid one more for luck.

At the end of the first session Mr and Mrs H. R. Abbott were in the lead, closely followed by H. Pickering and J. D. Thomson.

Although both pairs slipped back a little they held their respective positions at the end of the second session. In the meantime a Nelson pair. Mrs G. C. Saxton and A. Burt, had been moving up, and finishing well overtook the leaders to score 2104, and earn a very popular victory by a narrow margin. The Abbotts, in second place with 2084, were the first of a group of Christchurch players who took six of the first eight places. Pickering and Thomson (2075) were third, Mr and Mrs E. Rickard (2074) were fourth, with Mr and Mrs J. F. G. Lawson one point behind them. Difficult Auction The runners-up scored well on this deal from the third session. N. H—KQB64 D—AKJIO632 W. E. S—9 64 S—AB 5 H—AlO72 H—J953 D—B7s D—Q C—Q75 C—AlO9B3 S. S—KQJIO732 H—D—94 C—K642 The auction was not entirely straightforward:

The first two bids presented few problems, and then Abbott emphasised the strength of his longer suit by jumping to three diamonds. Mrs Abbott could only rebid her spades, and North then called four hearts which at this point must be a good five-card suit The news understandably failed to impress his partner, who quite correctly continued to four spades, the final contract. West led a diamond, captured by dummy’s ace under which the singleton queen fell. The declarer ruffed a heart to gain entry to her hand to draw the trumps. The king of spades was taken by East’s ace, and a spade returned. After drawing the rest of the trumps South crossed to dummy’s diamonds which provided suf-

’flcient discards for her losing clubs. Twelve tricks made was the best score on the deal.

When in with the ace of spades, East should of course have realised the danger of the solid diamond suit on the table, and should have tried to make what tricks were available in clubs. West, too, could have defended better. An opening lead of the unbid suit, in this case clubs, could very easily have defeated the contract.

East takes the first trick with the ace and returns the suit South wins with the king under which West drops the queen!

The declarer starts drawing trumps, but East wins the first round to cash the 10 and nine of clubs for the defeating trick. It is all very easy when you know where all the cards are.

w. N. E. s, 3H 3S 6H 6S No No

w. N. E. S. ID No IS No 3D No 3S No 4H No 4S