CONTRACT BRIDGE Clean Sweep In South Island Championship

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 32126, 23 October 1969, Page 11

CONTRACT BRIDGE Clean Sweep In South Island Championship

(Contributed by J.R.W.) The premier event of the local bridge calendar, the South Island championship, run this year by the Oamaru Bridge Chib, turned into a triumph for the Christchurch Bridge Club, its players filling the first three places. Last year’s winners, E. Dalton and L. S. Julian, had to be content with third place this time. Mrs W. Ellis and Sir Joseph Ward -set off at a great pace and at the halfway stage had established a good lead but they faded away towards the end to finish second. The winners were the very experienced partnership of H. Pickering and J. D. Thomson who made sure of the title with a fine last session. All the other competitors found the cards unusually difficult, and this deal tried

Against the eventual winners, North the dealer

opened proceedings with -a slightly borderline call’of two diamonds. Thomson passed and South responded three clubs. Pickering came in with three hearts. North raised the clubs and East called four hearts. South pushed on to five clubs, the final contract.

Pickering led the king of hearts, the top of a sequence, dummy followed with the seven and Thomson without hestitation overtook his partner’s lead with the ace. It was clear that left to himself the declarer could discard all his losers on North’s solid diamonds so the only hope for the defence was to take three tricks in the major suits immediately. Clearly in view of dummy’s singleton heart, there was only one trick in that suit, so two had to be made in spades. This was done when Thomson, having won the first trick, switched to a small spade. Had the declarer played low West’s jack would have won, and the ace would have defeated the contract South however correctly tried the king. Pickering captured this with the ace and returned a spade to his partner's queen to put the declarer one down. Suit Preference Against Mrs Ellis and Ward, after a rather different auction, North played the hand in five diamonds. East led the ace of hearts under which West dropped the king, in accordance with a convention known after its originator, McKenny. By following suit with an unnecessarily high card a player requests

the lead of the higher ranking side suit, in this case spades. In this particular instance the play of the three of hearts would have called for a club lead. Mrs Ellis duly switched to the queen of spades and whatever the declarer did the defenders could make two more tricks to defeat the contract Many North-South pairs were allowed to make five elubs or five diamonds against less inspired defence than that produced by the two leading pairs. But some West players did even better by making five hearts. North started the defence with the ace, then the king of diamonds. After ruffing, West drew trumps with the king and ace. With six tricks in hearts and one club ruff available in dummy it only remained to take four tricks in spades. This was done effortlessly, though rather luckily, by leading the queen from the East hand. If South played low, so did West and the lead remained in dummy. A small spade was then led to the' jack, the ace killed the king and dummy’s nine won the fourth round of the suit.

If, however, South played the king on the queen of spades. West won the trick with the ace, the jack killed North’s ten, and the nine and eight were good in dummy. Nothing is impossible with lady luck on your side.

the patience of many: N. S—10 5 B—7 D—A K Q 10 9 4 C—A 9 6 3 W. E. S—A J 3 2 S—Q 9 8 4 H—K Q J 10 6 3 H—A 9 5 2 D—3 D—S 7 6 2 C—4 2 C—5

s. S—K 7 6 H—8 4 D—J 5 C—K Q J 10 8 7