Bridge Blacks Back on Track.

An excellent day for both the Bridge Blacks and Bridge Ferns. The Bridge Blacks did what they had to do against weaker opposition and then had the bragging rights over Australia while the Bridge Ferns were extremely competitive against the strong USA 1 and England teams and collected most of the vps off Trinidad. Alas, still no joy for our Bridge Masters while the Mixed Blacks could not record a win, either:

 

                    Open (Bridge Blacks)                                                            Women (Bridge Ferns)

Match	Opponents	imps	NZ Vps	NZ Position		Match	Opponents	imps	NZ vps	NZ pos.
10.	Bangladesh	54-14	18.09	19th		10.	USA 1	29-41	6.72	15th
11.	Morocco	100-2	20.0	15th		11.	Trinidad	67-23	18.55	14th
12.	Australia	26-21	11.48	13th		12.	England	20-11	12.55	14th

 

              Seniors (Bridge Masters)                                                   Mixed (Mixed Blacks)

Match	Opponents	imps	NZ Vps	NZ Position		Match	Opponents	imps	NZ vps	NZ pos.
10.	Chinese Taipei	16-55	2.03	24th		10.	Poland	21-64	1.56	20th
11.	India	32-34	9.39	24th		11.	Romania	37-47	7.20	20th
12.	Norway	4-36	2.97	24th		12.	Brazil	27-36	7.45	20th

 

Some tough matches for our Mixed Blacks but time to relax with the a few post-mortems.
Kate Davies and John Patterson, Jane Lennon and Alan Grant and, in more serious mode,
Annette and Stephen Henry.

Ladies first. The Bridge Ferns’ win over 3^rd placed England produced just one significant swing when the English played in a 5-3 heart fit while Glenis Palmer as West played the 4 game, which was a more comfortable 4-4 fit.

 

With the K well-placed but the A badly placed for the declarer, Glenis played safely for 10 tricks. Shirley Newton, South, led a trump to the 4 game. East, the very experienced Nicola Smith, led a diamond to the king and Jenny Wilkinson’s ace. Back came a second trump.

A second diamond was played with Shirley winning to play a third trump to prevent a diamond ruff. At this point, a club to the queen and the discard of East’s losing diamond on the A would have brought 10 tricks. However, East did not touch clubs and when in with the K, Jenny played a third round of diamonds to defeat the contract.

A slip by declarer, for sure, but the swing only became a possibility after the excellent trump lead and continuation.

Our Women finished the day in 14^th place but only 12vps behind 4^th placed Japan. With 8 to qualify and 11 matches left, there is plenty to play for. Netherlands, South Africa and table-topping China await the Bridge Ferns on Day 5.

A World Record?

Under the new victory point system, it is quite hard to win a match by 27 vps, yes, vps not imps! Yet, the Bridge Blacks achieved that this day in the match against Morocco. The vp result was 20 – minus 7! The Moroccans arrived 38 minutes late, 2 minutes short of forfeiting the match. That 2 minutes enabled our Open team to post a ton of imps in a most convincing win.

 

Really, it was a shame the above board could not have been saved for a different match as Michael and Matthew were the only pair in the Open field to bid this slam. Apart from the 3 force, the bidding was natural up to 3NT. 4 confirmed a very strong hand and after a 4 cue-bid, Matthew checked on key cards. Two were enough for Matthew to bid and make his slam.

New Zealand picked up imps on 14 of the 16 boards, with, ironically, the only flat board being another slam (not the one above).  Job done.
The following nice declarer play occurred the previous evening in the Bridge Blacks’ win over Canada.

 

After a 1 opening from South, Matt Brown, West, got to become declarer in 3NT on the 8 lead. South took their ace and switched to the Q. Matt was now threatened to lose two spades, two diamonds and the A.

Matt took the A and played a diamond with South taking their ace and playing a second spade. Matt won with his king and played three rounds of clubs retaining an entry to dummy in that suit to leave the following cards:

                                                                                      (South irrelevant)

He exited a spade to North, throwing T from his hand. North could cash their high spade but then had to give Matt a free red suit trick… and Matt still had an entry to dummy’s long spade. It would not have helped North to exit without cashing the spade as Matt would have three red suit tricks, AK and 4 club tricks. Well played… for a flat board!

13^th place must feel wonderful as compared with 22^nd. Yet, 8^th place is still 30 vps away. Israel, Norway (8^th, and 7^th) and Egypt await on Day 5.

Richard Solomon

Australia are just ahead of the Kiwis in terms of South Pacific rivalry. Only the Bridge Ferns are ahead of their Australian rivals who are as follows in the four competitions:

Open              9^th

Women         18^th

Seniors          13^th

Mixed            15^th  

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