MONDAY COMPETITIONS / Season 2008-9 / June 2009
Programme
The Monday Programme for June is:
- 1st Pivot Teams 3
- 8th Summer Pairs 4
- 15th Pivot Teams 4
- 22nd Summer Pairs 5
- 29th Summer Teams 1
GCBA Results
Winter teams
The play off for the Winter Teams was won by: Alan Wearmouth, Tony Hill, Peter Waggett, Tim Ackers, Joe & Wendy Angseesing. . The remaining teams carried on playing for the Swiss Teams trophy, which was won by: Judy and Allan Sanis, Lindsay Geddes, Keith Sharp, Tony Letts and Brian Goalby.
Spring Pairs . A new Monday night feature this year was the Spring pairs. After three qualifying sessions the leaders were Daphne Hogarth and Chris Lewis. The leading ten pairs then played an all-play-all ‘A’ final. Barometer scoring was used with all pairs playing the same boards at the same time, so everybody can see who is winning as the evening progresses. There were two pairs who won jointly, Pam Pearce & Steve Evans tied with Chris Smith & John Councer. The consolation final was won by Jim Simons and Peter Waggett.
Cotswold Cup . What a good day we had on Sunday 19th April when we played for the Cotswold Cup! We all met for a tasty brunch and Allan Sanis organised an auction where we could buy our own or other teams. We entered as a pair and then played two lively sessions of bridge with team mates that we had drawn out of a hat. We were treated to a cream tea half way through the afternoon. Well done to the winners Daniel Hill, Ian Kane, Wendy Angseesing and Patrick Shields. The runners up were Rob Small, David Cook, Anne Swannell and Richard Harris. Peggy Phillips, Gill Grant-Duff, Eira Arkley and Angela Hall bought the winning team and took home £100. We also raised £67 for the Sue Ryder Hospice in Cheltenham from the auction. Thank you to all who worked hard to make it a great day. (Judy Sanis)
National Results.
Portland Pairs . Gloucestershire’s national success continues with a secondnational trophy this year for Pam Pearce. Playing with ex Gloucestershire player Ron (Ferret) Davis, Pam won the Portland Pairs, the EBU mixed pairs championship. 405 pairs took part nationwide.
National Pairs . Congratulations to Ian and Val Constable who were second in the South West regional qualifying heat. Derek Rue and Roger Jackson have also qualified for the national final.
Seniors KO teams . Two of the four teams that have reached the semi-final stage of the Seniors KO have Gloucestershire interest. Roger Jackson in one team, and Keith Stanley & Derek Rue in another have not been drawn to play each other so it would be nice to seen them meet in the final.
Crockfords Cup
For the second year runningPaul Denning and Patrick Shields, playing in a Welsh team, have reachedthe eight-team finalof Crockfords cup. Keith Stanley’s team, including Derek Rue, Alan Wearmouth and Tony Hill, fell at the last hurdle.
Midlands Counties League v Worcestershire: Dawes: Won 13-7 Porter: Lost 4-16 Markham: Lost 8-12 .
This result means that the first team have again won the Dawes Trophy. John Rookwood now stands down as captain with a 100% record over 2 years: 2 Dawes trophies and victory in the national inter-league playoff.
Problem hand
North
♠8 6 5
♥ K 9 4 2
♦ A Q 6
♣ A 5 2
West
♠ A K 4 2
♥ T 8
♦ T 8 7 5
♣ K J 7
SouthWestNorthEast
1♠P3NTP
4♥PPP
You cash ♠A, East plays ♠9 and South ♠7. How should you continue? Answer at end.
Tollemache HandThanks to Patrick Shields for supplying these hands. Gloucestershire came 5th in the Tollemache final.
This was Middlesex defending against us in the first match.
KQ62 J4
654
AKJ7
T9
AKT87
QJ73
Q8 / Board 8 Dlr : W
Vul : none / 74
Q632
A
T96432
AJ853
95
KT982
5
After the auction started 1♥ Dbl South ended in 4♠ and West started off with a top heart. Many players now play the lead of an ace asking for an attitude signal, and king for count. This is very helpful against high level contracts when the lead of an unsupported ace is more common, and avoids partner signalling the absence of the king when leader already has it in sight!
Here Jeremy Dhondy started with the ♥K and Ian Pagan could see a clear defence. He dropped the ♥Q on the king – clearly not a count signal but a request for a switch to the higher side suit – diamonds. So he was in at trick two and could lead back to the ♥A for a ruff. Good enough to beat the contract even if his partner’s diamonds were ten-high.
Here’s a hand from later in the event, when we played against East Wales.
965 QT
AKJ873
94
Q7
A873
96
A7532 / Board 28 Dlr : W
Vul : NS / AK843
K6
Q54
KQT
JT2
J9542
T2
J86
After a pass by West most North’s opened either 1♦ or 2♦, and East then had the choice of overcalling with NT or spades. The former would lead quickly to 3NT (the unbeatable contract at 7 tables out of 16) but it got more difficult when a spade overcall encouraged West to bid his clubs and East could see different potential games.
Against Dan McIntosh and Derek Rue, the opponents settled in 5♣ which looks fairly safe but the defence started off with three rounds of diamonds. On the third round, the ♦Q was ruffed by the ♣8 and over-ruffed by the ace.
Declarer now had a dilemma. He needed to draw the remaining four trumps and had the KQT with which to collect the missing J964. He chose a losing option by finessing the ♣T, to give our pair the only plus score for NS on this hand.
In a similar position in 4♠, the ♠T tried to force the ♠Q from dummy but declarer simply discarded and so protected himself against North having four spades.
Answer to Problem hand
Declarer’s bidding guarantees 5 spades so don’t be fooled by ♠7. You should give partner his ruff, but it is not good enough to cash ♠K first as declarer will be able to use his established spades to discard dummy’s club losers. You must continue with ♠2 at trick 2. East ruffs and switches to a club, setting you up a club trick. The contract may well go two off if declarer desperately tries the doomed diamond finesse in an attempt to reduce his losers from 4 to 3.