Bridge

Hi all

Yesterday Martin and I participated in the qualifiers for the Open Dutch Championships Pairs. It was a rough night, we crossed about every strong opponent in the room and took some less fortunate decisions. What do you think about this one?

All vulnerable, my RHO passed and so did I. LHO opens 2, either weak with or any semiforcing+. Martin overcalls 2 and I jump to game. Without taking a split second pause LHO bids 4. Martin competes with 5, RHO 5 and I was willing to compete to the 7 level. I bid a descriptive 6 and Martin finally got doubled in 6.

Well, don’t you just want to claim twelve tricks? East certainly has everything for his gameforcing hand in , doesn’t he? Martin took a confident finesse in . Bad news: it was offside. 

I have seen this before, people thinking a solid suit with an outside trick is worth a semiforcing.

Sigh!

I could barely suppress the urge to put a flamethrower on my opponent when he mentioned he did good this game. We scored 54%, occupying place 5, about 1% short in qualfying for next round. Better luck next year.

Hi all

Yesterday I showed you a game where Sjoerd was looking for gold. Today it’s about hitting gold:

Again an “Utrecht strong 1NT”. Sjoerd answered 2, showing 6+ hcp but less than three Napolitan controls. Wim bid his and Sjoerd bid a semi-positive 2NT, Wim 3 (nothing else to bid). Now Sjoerd gave one little push with a 4 cue. Wim blasted straight to the slam.

Wim had no real troubles after a lead. Va banque he played: Ace of , Ace and King of , to the Ace, discard a loser on the Queen and finesse against the Queen of trumps. Agreed, slam isn’t really odds on, but a slam that makes is a good slam.

Hi all

Last Saturday the teams season closed. We occupied a solid spot in the middle, but a lot happened in the top, favourite teams losing to underdogs. If we had scored 50 VIP out of 2 matches (instead of 36) then promotion would have been ours. Alas!

I was kibitzing Sjoerd in the second match (René and I played just the first match):

Nice. Sjoerd and Wim play some crazy system: Utrechtse Klaver. Canapé style with a strong 1NT opening. And by strong I mean 23+ balanced or 21+ unbalanced. DONT or Landy are not advised unless you are prepared for a massacre. The hand above fits nicely in their system, but it’s not your turn yet. Your LHO opens 1, passed to you.

Sjoerd started with double, buying the hand in 4.

Too bad the didn’t split. There are some remote chances of establishing an endplay if West takes a nap on the run of trumps, but 4 can always be defeated (West should keep a small ). Sjoerd had some fantasies of finding partner with a magic hand, but later he agreed to my practical suggestion: 3NT. You have 9 solid tricks, so do the obvious thing.

Hi all

Last Tuesday wasn’t a rich day. René cancelled because of the flu, so I played with Martin. But it wasn’t a good day for both of us. I had full values and good spots for a vulnerable Muiderberg, but the opponents grabbed hold of me for -800. A couple more disasters: -500 against triggerhappy opponents in some partscore, -1100 because I thought our run-away-system didn’t apply. All disasters were quite expensive, especially when it’s imps. Here’s a nice one, it still makes me smile.

East preempted 3 and I had a very, very clean Leaping Michaels’ with 4, West raised to 4 and Martin bid the game. West pondered for some time and eventually bid 5, doubled by Martin. East immediately commented West: “Heb je de kwetsbaarheid gezien? Rukker!”. It’s near impossible to translate, maybe something like: “Did you check the vulnerability? Wanker!”. I wet myself from laughter.

Actually bidding 5 won them two imp, because West’s other option was to double 5, and that would’ve been -550.

Hi all

Last Saturday I played a small (13 teams) Patton tournament. I can say we beat all the good teams fair and square, but against very soft opposition we failed. Badly! I already know what I want for Christmas, a tool to hammer out all my basic errors.

There were some memorable events, René and I wrapped up ten tricks in 4 while Sjoerd and Wim scored ten tricks as well in 4. The opponents tried a vulnerable game after Rene had opened a strong . They discarded our convention card and didn’t ask for any explanation after my alert. Maybe they don’t care about an occasional -500.

East opened 1 and René jumped to 3 (weak), West supported , passed to René. Not afraid he introduced his four card suit, passed out. I thought 4 would be way too high, so I pretended to have a nice four card fit for him. The defence started with three rounds of , René getting rid of his losers. He ruffed the continuation and played a to the Ten for the King. Again a , ruffed. Next he cashed the Ace, crossed to the King and the Queen of . Yay! Trumps split, run the rest of the for nine tricks.

A nice 4-3 fit dummy reversal. At the other table the bidding was exactly the same (!), but North ran to 4, one off.

Hi all

I participated in a threesome last night… Don’t hold your breath, it was just a regular clubnight at Dombo, I played with Martin and Peter-Paul. I was kibitzing Peter-Paul when this deal came up.

So, what to open with this hand (first hand all red)?

I’m still not sure what I would do, but Peter-Paul made up his mind fairly quick and opened 4. Yikes! I hadn’t thought of that. If and are switched I would agree, but I’m not brave enough with just a five card suit in . Everybody looks sort of happy and West leads the 3 (odd leads).

Game must be on for the opponents on their combined 26 count, so going off a couple doesn’t matter in a pairs game. But dummy has some very useful cards, maybe 4 even comes home. What do you require to make 4? Either find West with the Ace of doubleton or a successful finesse against the Jack. And you need a 3-3 split with the King onside.

The lead runs via the King to your Ace. A small towards the Queen stays alive and a ducked to West’s bare Ace also works. The defence shifts to now and you ruff the 3rd round. A ruff follows, the butterflies in your stomach are shouting for a 3-3 split.

Too bad, they split 2-4 and loss of control couldn’t be avoided. Peter-Paul was set three tricks.

3NT isn’t exactly laydown for EW, but will (and did) in practice almost never fail.

Hi all

I have been silent for some days. Study, work and some slacking kept me from posting.

Swinging the axe
A hand from last Dombo clubnight (vulnerable against not).

It’s a regular 28 count. Here’s what happened, you open something strong and your LHO jumps to 4, passed back to you. You put your red card on the table radiating violence, passed to your RHO. Tiny pearls of sweat appear on him. Is he? Is he? Yes, he runs to 4NT, showing both minors. Again more red. LHO doesn’t look happy, but bids 5. A last red card and partner starts with the Queen.

EW have a trump trick, but that’s all. Down ten, I haven’t seen this score before: +2600.

Receiving the axe
Unfortunately I don’t have a diagram or hand anymore. An approximate guess: I held something like eight solid , a void somewhere and at least an Ace and King in the other two suits. I know I started with a strong and the defence interfered a couple of times with destructive rainbow-ish garbage. René and I desperately tried to stay inside the relayframework, but it got disgustingly complicated. Up to 4 René had shown a balanced hand with one Ace. This got doubled (leaddirecting or just penalty, who knows) and I redoubled, thinking/hoping it was a superrelay, then it would ask what Ace he held. Opposite the right Ace slam would be odds on. But now René and I were not on the same wavelength, he passed out 4 redoubled. He thought was my suit and the redouble was for business. Well, I have 3400 reasons my redouble was not for business.

Hi all

Yesterday at Star I played like… like… in Dutch one can say “like a wet newspaper”. I guess that comes close. Defensive errors all around. Missed an easy biddable slam. Argh! And if everything goes bad, then I shouldn’t have tried this:

Sitting South I opened a 14-16 NT, René raised me to the NT game immediately without introducing his . I like that, North has more than enough (soft values) for game, and those , well, if we have a fit, they work in 3NT as well. And you keep them hidden from the opponents.

The defence kicks off with a . I ponder for some time, reviewing my chances. What am I going to collect? I need a favourable position for four tricks, one and two . I need more than just the Queen onside, I just don’t get to 9 tricks (unless the Queen of drops doubleton, of course). West having Ace-Queen of seems too remote a chance.

So I devised a cunning plan.

Back to the lead, East put in the  Queen and returned the 9 for dummy. Now I played a small from table, a surprised West winning the trick with the 7. Now when he returned another I had butterflies in my stomach, it looks like the are breaking and West is desperately looking for a way to put East on lead. So I put up the King.

Curtains!

East shoots back a and I loose six tricks in the black suits. Losing an additional 3 imp for all my efforts, cause all other pairs were only set one trick.

Hi all

Here’s a game from one of Dombo’s teams matches last week. It’s a nice deal to analyze. If I could only bring up the concentration to do this during a match instead of post mortem.

South had to play 4 doubled. During the auction West interfered with some number of and East finally doubled 4. West starts with the King. Plan the play!

Let’s do this together. Trumps are very likely to be 1-4 both honours offside, a loser, are soft and the have to be tackled as well. Ducking the lead doesn’t do much harm, the continuation is for your Ace. Draw one round of trumps by running the Ten. East plays back a for the King in dummy. Tackle the now, the Queen and Jack hold but West discards the 2nd round. So trumps and are 1-4.

This gets complicated.

Cash the Ace and ruff a small with the Ace. East discards something. Cross to the Ace and ruff a with the Jack. East will overruff, but now South has only trumps left, resulting in three trump tricks in your hand, one in dummy, three tricks, two in and the Ace of .

Full deal:

Without the double South will probably play va banque, double finesse in , and nemesis will overcome him. I wouldn’t double them, maybe it will gain +100 (or an unlikely +300), but warning the opponents into a thoughtful magic plan is a very bad thing.

Hi all

Last night René had obligations elsewhere. Lucky me, Elske agreed to sit opposite me. She bid like a true Viking, dangerously high. I like that, though it costed me some time and palpitations to adapt. But no relays, we agreed to something Dutch Acolish. And then this game came across:

We had an undisturbed auction (involving Check back Stayman) to 4. But both hands fit like gloves, no wasted honours, so 6 is a very good slam. But it’s quite unbiddable in a natural system.

What about Viking Precision? Would it have gotten us to slam?

 

1

pass

1NTGF

pass

21

pass

2

pass

2NT2

pass

3

pass

33

pass

3

pass

34

pass

4

pass

4NT5

pass

5

pass

56

pass

5

pass

67

pass

6

South initiates a gameforcing sequence with 1NT, North obliges with:
1. minimum, balanced or sidesuit in other Major
2. balanced
3. 3-5-3-2 distribution
4. 1 Ace
5. 2 Kings of the same rank
6. 1 Queen
7. Queen

Maybe the last couple of relays are not obvious, cause slam without trump Queen is a no go, and finding out is not without danger. But during the sequence South must feel like: “Really? Really? Really? Can it be?” And then slam is unavoidable.