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Otago- Southland News with Brad Johnston

Winter is Coming?

Otago/Southland have kept up the standard calendar of having a tournament (nearly) every weekend for those that want to go away. This year there were fewer people taking up the opportunities, especially when, for some reason, it involved travelling South.

Thankfully we were able to run almost all of the planned tournaments, and congratulations to the following players for doing well:

Winton Intermediate Teams (8 teams)

1st

Jeff Elton, Sherry Elton, Jan Brown, Yvonne Hughes

88.18vps

2nd

Richard Hishon, Pam Macleod, Sandy Buzzard, Jen White

81.44 vps

3rd

Karen Palmer-Hall, Judith Lawton, Lee Davies, Linda Taylor

81.41 vps

 

Invercargill Open Pairs (18 pairs)

1st

Kevin Skoropada, Moss Wylie

118.75%  

2nd

Anne Somerville, Lorraine Oliver

115.36%

3rd

Robyn Hellier, Trish Morris

112.76%

 

Oamaru Graded Pairs (36 pairs)

1st

Frances Sheehy, Donna Ruwhiu

126.08%

2nd

Lorraine Peacock, Margaret Perley

124.60%

3rd

Brad Johnston, Lydia Turley

123.14%

 

Taieri Open B Pairs (30 pairs)

1st

John Sheehy, Frances Sheehy

124.68%

2nd

Kevin Farnden, Kaye Wilson

118.30%

3rd

Paul Freeland, Margaret Perley

117.14%

 Frances and John Sheehy.png
  Mother and son winners at Taieri, Frances and John Sheehy

Queenstown Open Pairs (30 pairs)

1st

Maggie Stratford, Sherril Harries

117.30%

2nd

Lorraine Oliver, Kay Shand

115.38%

3rd

Dianna Evans, Ron Evans

113.46%

 

Cromwell Open Pairs (26 pairs)

1st

Jenny Pryde, Marion Furneaux

123.76%

2nd

Elwyn Hughes, Elspeth Welsh

120.72%

3rd

Sherril Harries, Maggie Stratford

120.34%

 

Cromwell Open Teams

This event wasn’t run due to not having enough entries.

 

Winton Open Teams (10 teams)

1st

Paul Freeland, Margaret Perley, Chris Ackerley, Arleen Schwartz

79.24vps

2nd

Sam Coutts, Glenn Coutts, Peter Hall, Brad Johnston

65.64vps

3rd

Moss Wylie, Lindsay Glover, Anne Somerville, Kevin Skoropada

62.21vps

 

              Computer Favourites!

Chris A Arleen Margaret Paul Freeland.png
  Winton winners,Chris Ackerley, Arleen Schwartz, Margaret Perley and Paul Freeland.

Something interesting happened at the Winton Teams. After 4 rounds, the Freeland team was reported to be on 80.68 Vps, 26 clear of the field. Assuming they play the same type of bridge in Winton as they do elsewhere, getting a maximum score in every round would have netted you 80 Vps – no wonder they won with this sort of leg up. The scoring software seemed to be playing favourites and had assigned them an extra 10 vps that no-one had noticed throughout the day.

 

The Otago Bridge Club also held a Lions (Camp Quality) Fundraiser Tournament, which was well supported by 42 pairs. Over $1000 was raised for charity, and the honours on the day went to:

1st

Matt Blakeley, Philip Noye

68.70%

2nd

Kevin Farnden, Kaye Wilson

67.60%

3rd

Donna Ruwhiu, Kristen Collins

63.70%

 

Phil and Matt are both working actively to help improve the quality of bridge by running the learners’ lessons, organising and running advancers seminars, and distributing weekly notes breaking down the boards played in the Intermediate / Junior divisions at the bridge club. It’s good to see that they can disprove the “those who can, do; those who can’t, teach” idea!

Entries were also down in the South for the Rubber Bridge. The Otago Bridge Club tends to be able to field around 10 pairs, but this year were scrambling for a fourth. In total, the region has 12 pairs competing for a place in the National Finals in Hamilton.

One thing that the Otago Bridge Club does well is that it runs a cross divisional year-long teams’ tournament. This tends to be well supported both by top players at the club as well as less experienced players – as for them it’s a novel change in how to play bridge. The Otago Bridge Club even uses paper scoring instead of any digital method, which makes the process of scoring up with your opponents an integral part of the night instead of an incidental one.

This year we’ve got 30 teams competing in a qualifying Swiss before we’ll break off into divisions and play a double-round robin throughout the year. I’d strongly recommend that all clubs look into offering some sort of teams’ style event if you are not already.

Making things easy on partner

North Deals
None Vul
A J 9 6
A Q J 7
K 8 7 5
10
7 5
K 10 8
J 6 2
A Q 5 4 3
 
N
W   E
S
 
8 4 3 2
6
A Q 10
K J 8 7 6
 
K Q 10
9 5 4 3 2
9 4 3
9 2
West North East South
  1  Pass 1 
Pass 4  All pass  

 

 This hand from the Winton Open Teams provided an opportunity for East players to go astray. Imagine defending 4Heart-small after the above auction.
West doesn’t have an inspiring collection from which to lead, but may lead a diamond trying to lead through dummy's strength. Say it goes: Diamond-small6, Diamond-small7 from dummy, Diamond-smallQ, Diamond-small4.


East can see that they could be entitled to 2 more diamond tricks (they are on the deal) if their partner can get in, and perhaps a club trick; but the spades and hearts seem to be onside for declarer from East's perspective. East should switch to a club because it’s the only real option for the defence.

If they switch to a low club, it’s easy for partner to win and play another diamond through for -1, but some East players switched to the Club-smallK orClub-small J. This makes it difficult for West, as they may not see the need to overtake this. Once East’s club holds, they’d be thinking “why didn’t my partner overtake my club for another through?” and conclude that the winning defence must be to tap dummy by playing another club. If West had 4 trumps instead of South having 5, this would promote them a trump trick through shortening dummy's trumps and making it impossible for South to pick up their Heart-smallK. Switching to a low club is the mark of a strong defender, envisioning partner's possible problems and finding a way to guide them on the right path.
You are there to help your partner if you can.

 

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