Ron and Lynne Heath
Margot Wilson and John Gardner
Mark Hooper and Phil Norman
Tim Dunsby and Krzysztof Ginda
Ann Sharples and Bob Mott
The teams are split into four groups of nine or ten teams with the leading two teams going through to the final. Dorset teams have always found the Tolle hard going in recent years so mid-table respectability rather than a top-two finish was a realistic objective.
The weekend started better than we could have hoped for with a 19-1 in the local derby against Devon, and after scoring 9 and 15 in our other two matches we found ourselves in the lead after the first session.
Unaccustomed to such dizzy heights and suspecting that it was too good to last, some members of our team took a photo of the leader board at this point. I was more hopeful, having been around long enough to remember the annus mirabilis when Dorset topped the leader board at the end of the weekend, but the pessimists were proved right as we failed to win another match and slowly slipped down the table to finish a disappointing eighth out of ten teams.
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| Some of the team discussing the hands after the first session, when the scoreboard looked like this (photos from Tim) |
This was an interesting hand in our match against Cambridgeshire, the eventual winners, which we lost narrowly 11-9. Looking at just the East-West cards, the best contract is a diamond part score. Tim and Krzysz managed to stop in a sensible 3 Diamonds, but the other three tables all stretched to poor game contracts.
At our table we had three opponents as the lady international sitting West was heavily pregnant. Her partner was a former British chess champion, who tries to cultivate a mad professor image (he is actually a maths professor in real life) by not bothering to waste any money at the hairdressers.
A heart would have been the best lead against 3NT, but I led a normal six of clubs which ran to declarer's ten. Now she played ace, king and a low diamond to Ann's queen, discarding a spade and two hearts from dummy. South should really play the queen of hearts now - declarer is marked with eight diamonds and at least two clubs, and presumably has something in spades, so there is not room for more than one heart, and dummy still has a double stop in clubs. However, I had done my best to put Ann off by playing a Smith peter to encourage a club continuation, so Ann dutifully played back a club to the queen, king and ace.
Now declarer played a low spade off the board and went into the tank when Ann played low. It may look a pure guess whether to play the queen or the ten, but the queen is the correct play, in theory if not in practice. If the queen wins you are home and dry, while even if the ten draws North's ace the defence may be able to run at least three heart tricks.
You would have hoped that an international player would see this quite quickly but it took at least ten minutes before she played a card. As this was the last match of the day, well past my bedtime and the opponents had already been very slow I was not best pleased, but eventually declarer worked it out and played the queen so I won and played jack and another club. Stranded in dummy, declarer exited with a heart to my seven so I cashed my last club, forcing dummy to discard down to K of spades and K 8 of hearts.
Normally I would just cash the ace of hearts and claim two down, but I was a grumpy old man by this stage and so I decided to insult declarer by playing the jack of hearts. This prompted another interminable pause but, no doubt exhausted by all that thinking, she played low (a clear error this time) so I could cash my remaining hearts for down four.
Can you see where declarer went wrong in the middle of the hand? When she played a low spade from dummy, it would be better to play the king, as it would be very difficult for a defender to duck smoothly without giving away the location of the ace. On the actual hand my singleton ace would remove any need for a guess in spades.
At another table Phil Norman declared 3NT from the East seat after North had made a rather wild 3 club overcall. South led a club and Phil won and played a club back. North won and erred in a big way by cashing the ace of spades and switching to ace and another heart. Two winning clubs now squeezed South and 3NT was made.
At the fourth table the Cambridge West played in 5 Diamonds. With North being endplayed at trick 1, there is no defence and the contract made.
This was an instructive hand where Ann and I managed to mangle an easy defence. First though, you are declarer as South in 3NT on the lead of the jack of diamonds. Which card do you use to win the first trick?
If you think that's a pointless question, look at what happened
Declarer won with the queen and played the queen of hearts, ducked and the jack of hearts to the ace. Now East switched to the king of spades, West giving count with the five, and played a low spade to West's ace. Now West had two options; on the actual hand you need to cash out in spades, but if declarer has the queen of spades and partner the ace of diamonds you must play a club to stick the lead in dummy and hope for two diamond tricks at the end. I was West and it goes without saying that I chose the wrong option.
If declarer is missing the ace of diamonds he is a bit light for his bidding but I had expected partner to play the queen of spades if she had it. The play of the king did not promise the queen, as partner had to assume that I had the ace of spades for us to have a chance. But there was another clue that I missed at the time - East had followed with the two on the first round of hearts. The way we play Smith peters that was a discouraging card in my first suit (diamonds) and should have pointed me to the winning play.
Now you see why declarer was right to play the queen of trick one. If he had played the ace or king, even I could not have got this wrong.
