Busman’s holiday for Christchurch director

Press, 1 May 1984, Page 12

Busman’s holiday for Christchurch director

What do tournament directors do when they are not employed? They play bridge of course, what else? J. F. G. Lawson, who directs two or three nights of the week, also supervises most tournaments in the Canterbury area and many other South Island events over the week-ends. Obviously he does not have many opportunities to play. For the Christchurch Bridge Club anniversary tournament he made an exception, and that was how the partnership of Lawson

and J. R. Wignail was formed. He may not have actually played bridge since last August, but he had in the meantime had plenty of opportunities to watch. It was certainly not his fault that he and his partner did not feature in the prize list. There were two highlights. The first came when an obvious error on a travelling score sheet was detected, allowing Lawson to achieve the ambition of a

life-time by calling a Tournament Director. The second arose on this hand dealt by South, with neither side vulnerable:

The auction at their table

Playing Acol, after two passes North opened with the artificial game-forcing bid of two clubs, to which South responded two diamonds, denying 8 high-card points. The opener continued with two hearts, and Lawson introduced his spades. North now jumped to five spades, asking his partner to call six with either good spades, or with moderate spades and the ace of diamonds. Despite the general weakness of his hand, South picked up the message brilliantly, and went on to the small slam. The play presented no problems. West led a club, which the declarer won in hand with the jack. The correct way to play the spade suit is to hope that West has either the king or queen or both, and to lead

the jack from hand, playing low from dummy if it is not covered. Subsequently, he repeats the finesse. When West played the queen of spades on the jack, however, the declarer won with the ace, to continue with another trump to the 10 and king. That was the first and only trick for the defence. He won the diamond switch with the ace, drew the last trump, discarded one of his losing diamonds on dummy’s fourth club, and ruffed the other on the table. Six spades bid and made was not a bad achievement on the first hand of bridge Lawson had played for some seven months. The winners were Mrs J. Evitt and Ms R. H. Palmer, who headed the field both open and on handicap, a very fine achievement. They too had an excellent result on a slam hand, and again it was all in the bidding. North dealt with both sides vulnerable:

CONTRACT BRIDGE

J.R. Wignall

As soon as she heard of club support Mrs Evitt had no hesitation in calling the small slam, and was soon rewarded.

With a difficult opening lead, West started with the king of spades, taken by the declarer’s ace. Playing with great care, South drew two rounds of trumps with the ace and king, cashed the king of hearts, ruffed her small spade in dummy and discarded a low diamond on the ace of hearts. She returned to hand with the ace of diamonds and led the jack of spades, discarding a heart from the table when this was not covered. East was able to ruff with his last club, but South could trump the return, and ruff out the queen of spades to collect 12 tricks for her well bid and well played slam. Since hardly any other pair reached six clubs, their result on the board went a long way to helping Mrs Evitt and Ms Palmer to their winning score.