Winning a tight qualifier by about 20 IMPs against Hassett/Hirst, Dhondy/Kaye, Collins/Kendrick entitled Richard Palmer’s team of Palmer/Thornton (Berks&Bucks) and Procter/Robinson (Oxon) to challenge Hackett/Waterlow, Hallberg/Holland, Price/Simpson for the right to represent England in this year’s European Seniors Championship.
Our position as underdogs was confirmed throughout the first day’s 48 boards, being marginally on the losing end of all six sets and a total of 53 IMPs behind (47-100). However we took a lot of encouragement from the facts that as a team we made very few errors, that part-score swings evenly matched and that at least two of the four double-figure swings of the day could have gone the other way with a different lie of the cards and would have seen us close the day level had they done so. We were certainly not out of it and perhaps the lie of the cards would be more favourable to us on the second day.
Some hands from the first day:
After losing 1 IMP on the first set, a hand from the second set:
Ax, x, AJTxxxxx, Ax. Partner opens 1H, you bid 2D and partner repeats his hearts. Hackett/Waterlow were playing “2 over 1” so 2D was game forcing and Waterlow was able to bid 3D forcing and 4D over 3NT, leading them to a final contract of 6D. Palmer had to find a different rebid and chose 3NT. When dummy put down KQJx, Axxxx, Q, xxx he could see that 3C or 4D would have worked better. With 6D cold and 3NT one off on a club lead that was 16 IMPs away.
Third set: Partner opens a weak 2 spades in third seat and oppo bid to 4H. Do you bid 4S at game all holding JT9, Qxx, QTx, ATxx? Clearly there are chances of defeating 4H and 4S could easily be two off, so it was perhaps surprising when Price/Simpson pushed our pair to 5H. However their bidding was vindicated in two ways – Partner has QJxx in clubs to go with his spades, clubs are 4-1 with the king onside and so 4S would only be one off – and then our declarer missed the line in 5H and went one off for a further 12 IMPs away. 31 IMPs down after 24 boards.
The next set saw us lose a few IMPs on each of four boards, totalling 12 away, but the talking point was a flat board. I held K, Qx, AQxxxx, KQxx. Mike opened 1NT (15-17) and I was able to make a slam try showing 5 or more diamonds and 4 clubs by bidding 3S. Mike said 4D accepting the invitation and I considered the possible losers. We have 31-33 points, so I thought 13 tricks unlikely. If we were missing AK of hearts we still would make 6D without a heart lead. We play Kickback so 4H is Roman Key-card Blackwood. I decided to bid 6D direct to eliminate the possibility of LHO asking for a heart lead. Partner’s hand was Axxx, Axx, KTx, Axx. Do you want to be in 7 with a number of chances against most distributions? Had I bid 4H, I think partner’s 4-control response would have been enough for me to give it a go and 13 tricks rolled in when diamonds were 2-2 and the clubs unnecessarily divided 3-3 too. I have not heard how the oppo also stopped short.
Board 40 gave us our next opportunity for a double-figure swing our way. You hold AKxxxx, QT9x, x, AK and hear 3C on your right. Double seems right and partner bids 4H. 5C cue from you, 5D from partner, 5S from you, 6H from partner closes the auction. His hand: Jxx, KJxxx, Axx, xx – whilst he is minimum for his 4H bid it is no less than you expect, just a pity that he doesn’t have a doubleton spade and the spades don’t break and there isn’t a singleton queen either. Unlucky, but surely likely to be matched at the other table. Not this time, Richard electing not to pre-empt and the oppo bidding limply unopposed to just 4S. 11 IMPs away which on another day could have been 11 in.
On to the final set of the day 49 down and hoping to get at least one winning session in before close of play. Five small gains including an adjusted score for a failure to alert would have achieved this but for the following exhibit which just about summed up the day!
You hold Jx, Kxx, xxx, T98xx and hear Pass, Pass, 2NT (19-21) on your right. You pass, LHO bids 3S showing minors, RHO bids 4D, LHO 4H, RHO 4S, the latter two both showing controls. RHO then shows 4 controls and the diamond queen before LHO jumps to 7D. Your lead. Against a grand it is usually right to lead a trump being the least likely to give a trick away. However RHO’s 4 controls and the queen if diamonds account for most of his 19-21 points and LHO knows this, so he must be counting on a significant number of club tricks. Considering that there was a possibility that I would not have made a Lightner double with a void club for fear of pushing them to a making 7NT, Mike led the club ten. Dummy put down xxx, x, JTxx, AKQJx. Declarer won, crossed to the heart ace, ruffed a heart, played a trump back to hand and ruffed another heart. He then drew trumps, ran four clubs and fell back on the spade finesse for the 13th trick. Hallberg’s hand had been AQxx, Axx, AKQx, xx and later pointed out what would happen on a diamond lead – win, heart, heart ruff, diamond, heart ruff. Now there are no diamonds in dummy to lead a trump back to hand, so declarer will play a spade to the ace, draw trumps and fail when the clubs don’t break. When our pair started 1D – 2C – 2NT (15-19) and stopped in 3NT that was 17 away whereas 7D-1 would have made it 13 in. However the main story of the hand was that on my side of the screen Hallberg had not alerted 3S – because at the time he had thought it was natural and only realized it was for the minors after making a 4D cue in support of spades! As I had a similar situation myself on a part-score hand and also fell on my feet I can’t complain too much – but he gained 17 IMPs whereas mine was on a flat board.
The events of the second day are described here.
