CONTRACT BRIDGE Black days for New Zealand bridge

Press, Volume CXII, Issue 32959, 4 July 1972, Page 15

CONTRACT BRIDGE Black days for New Zealand bridge

(Contributed by

J.R.W.)

The eighth day of the world bridge tournament was particularly frustrating for New Zealand. The first match against Ireland was narrowly lost, largely because of an unfortunate bidding misunderstanding stemming originally from a highly artificial opposing sequence.

The next opponents were the Italians in a match staged on Viewgraph. The play reached a high standard and the Kiwis were by no means outclassed. Though they lost, they had two most unlucky results. F. Lu and J. R. Wignall reached seven spades on: W. E. S—KQ 10 742 S—A3 H—K 10 4 H—A 9 7 D—A 4 D—QlO 6 2 C—KQ C—AJ74 Only four spades, including the jack, in the North hand will defeat this contract, and this is what they found. The Italians mysteriously stopped in six. Then both sides reached a vulnerable four spades which both declarers boiled down to a situation where they had to guess which of two cards to play. The New Zealander guessed wrong, the Italian solved his problem by shuffling them, handing them face down to an onlooker and inviting him to choose one. He picked correctly. This deal produced a rich reward for bold bidding: N. S—62 H—AK 10 8 D—9862 C—KQS W. E. S—A K QJBS 5—109743 H—943 H—J 5 D—7 D—Q J 4 3 C—A9 3 C—J 10 S. H—Q7 62 D—A KlO 5 C—B7 64 2

With S. J. Abrahams and M. Cornell of Auckland East and West, the auction was:

Though this contract duly went one down, it was a good result, as the events when the board was replayed proved:

South showed great determination in pushing on to a five level contract opposite a partner who had previously passed, but was justified in his optimistic view when North made 12 tricks. The New Zealanders had fought hard and a trifle unluckily against the best bridge team in the world, so the last match of the day came as an anti-climax. The New Zealanders were unfortunate that they had to meet the Netherlands, a team then playing with great flair and luck. The Dutch had little trouble in winning easily. Morale was low Then followed a period of five black days for New Zealand bridge. During this time the team played well below its capabilities. The hands tended to be freakish and were always hard to deal with, the players were buffeted by ill-luck and wrong decisions, and it was not difficult to lose confidence completely. The gloom was lightened only by good wins over the Bahamas, Belgium and Chile and a particularly well-deserved victory over Sweden. But there were losses to Brazil, the Philippines, Denmark. Austria, India, Turkey, Spain, South Africa and Venezuela. It was a particularly frustrating time because while the matches with the highly ranked Chinese and Australians were also lost, they were close and keenly fought The players showed they could produce good bridge 'on occasions but a few un-

fortunate errors in each game were extremely costly. After the round-robin, in which the 39 countries all played each other, New Zealand finished thirty-third, a disappointing placing which by no means reflects the players’ abilities. Australia was eleventh, a result that will barely satisfy its supporters. The winners of the roundrobin were, as expected, the Italians, the United States being second. Third was a tenacious Canadian team and fourth, after a spirited finish, was France. There - was general sympathy with the Chinese team from Taiwan who had been up with the leaders all the way, and who slipped out of the top four only on the last day. In the semi-finals Italy will play France and the United States and Canada will contest the other berth in the finals. In the final clash of the Old World and the New, the odds are still on the side of the Europeans.

w. N. E. S. —• ID No IH 2S 3H 4S All Pass

w. N. E. S. —— No No No IS Dble 2S 3S 4S No No 4NT No 5H All Pass