A Cool Morning in NZ and hot bridge in Beijing

It’s quite a cool morning as we set off with a plan to Geocache in the area today and so you can see how  pretty it is around here… a nearby waterfall

We left  the Beijing final after the first three boards in the final stanza.

We have arrived at deal 4 and once again we have a swing board. Your hand is

S A65 H AQJ852 D K7 C 97

and you East, are in third chair with all vulnerable. You partner passes and North opens 1NT (15-17). You bid 2D which shows a major. South passes and your partner bids 2S (pass or correct). Knowing that your partner has a heart fit you bid 2NT (values) and your partner bids 3C (natural). You bid? Ming bid 3NT and South, Brock doubled. On a diamond lead you have nine tricks when the heart king is onside doubleton. Partners hand;

S 97 H 9643 D J96 C AJ102

Obviously 4H is better but 3NTX is worth 750 and 11 imps when they play in 3H making four the other way when Dhondy did not show any help to her partner after her heart overcall of 1NT. (I think I might have raised to 3H, but it is easy now). By the end of the first four boards the Chinese had scored 33 unanswered imps and were now trailing England by only 14 imps. I can hardly imagine how excited the Chinese must have been to watch this performance.

Meanwhile in the Seniors the Americans scored 10 imps as well when they got to the heart game while the Japanese played part-score. The Americans had gained 21 imps in the last two boards and were now within 3 of Japan.

By the way in the England-Italy  Open match the Italians had reached 4H from the West hand after East had also bid 2D over 1NT. Here Gold for England lead a small heart from his doubleton king and Versace with only 3 hearts missing knew that Townsend had at most one heart and rose ace. Certainly an anti-percentage play especially as he knew that Gold had most of the high cards. In the other room where they played 3NT Duboin found a spade lead which defeats 3NT since declarer can’t setup a diamonds trick without giving up the club suit, the only entry to dummy.

Board 5 was another 10 imps to the US seniors when they made an impossible 4S and by board 6 the USA was in the lead in th seniors 179 to 172.

Board 7 was the next action board.  This hand ended any run England might have made in the Open match, helped Japan to gain some lost momentum in the seniors and at least temporarily ended the Chinese run in the women’s match.

Deal 7 East-West vulnerable Dealer South

	S J8543
	H Q65
	D —
	C AKJ104
S 10962		S KQ7
H A2		H KJ7
D AKQ93		D J854
C 82		C 976
	S A
	H 109842
	D 10762e
	C Q53

In most of the matches after West started things off with 1D, North overcalled 1S and eventually East-West  arrived in 3NT.     In the Open match when England held the East-West cards after this start Sementa doubled 3NT hoping to get a club lead and West redoubled!   Duboin had no problem with the lead.  He started with the SA and when Sementa played a low spade for suit preference Italy took the next 5 club tricks for +1000. while in the other room did not double and collected 200, 13 imps for Italy.   In the women’s where the Chinese North overcalled 2C. 3NT was never going to be the contract (maybe it pays to overcall your weak suit sometimes) and the Chinese who were aggressive throughout wound up in a pretty terrible 5C contract where they were lucky to escape for -200.  Put that together with -200 by their partners in the “normal” 3NT contract and that was  9 imps back for England.    Board 8 was one of the quieter boards.  The English did pick up another 9 in the women’s match on Board 9 when the Chinese got way too high and the Chinese failed to  find the defense to get a plus score against the English part-score.  But Board 10 was to be the next big swing hand… More next post.