Preparation continues ...

We'll be flying off to Pau in a couple of weeks and our preparations continue unabated. All three pairs are working hard, as they sometimes tell me but more often rumours reach me of the 'hard taskmaster that we have'. I'm sure it helps to have a common enemy!

All the systems are in now and the final analysis shows:

Systems

5-card majors: 41
4-card majors: 10
Polish Club: 7
Strong Club: 10
Magic Diamond: 1

Strong 1NT: 48
Weak 1NT: 9
Variable: 12

• 47 pairs are playing a Multi 2♦, 10 pairs a weak 2♦ and 12 pairs something more exotic
  
• About half the pairs use two-suiter major suit openers at the two level

Defences have been prepared against the Brown Sticker Conventions and I'm happy that these are not going to be an issue for the team.

Over the final couple of weeks we'll be discussing general strategy and plan for how the team will cope with the actual playing. The team has considerable experience playing at this level and it will be interesting, at least for me, to see whether my ideas and style are 'fresh', boring or irrelevant. I'm sure they will let me know.
 

It's not my week

Back to the Russell Cup playing with Laura and we could not buy a score. OK, we could have improved our score by beating 2♠ doubled at least one of the three times we defended the contract, but the following hand seemed to sum up the evening perfectly.

♠ Axx ♥ A ♦ AJxx ♣ AKT9x

♠ KQTxxx ♥ Jxxxx ♦ K ♣ Q

West	North	East	South
Paul	Reg	Laura	David
			p
1♣	1♥	1♠	p
2♦	p	3♠	p
5NT	p	7♠	p
p	p

We had a smooth auction to the top spot but we went unrewarded as David led a club, ruffed by Reg, and Reg returned a heart, ruffed by David. We were the only pair in the grand slam so another bottom. I chastised David for leading a club when Reg had failed to make a Lightner Double, and chastised Reg for not doubling and failing to bid more enthusiastically with his 7-5 distribution.

Naturally they smiled and just took the matchpoints.
 

Crashing out

It is rare to lose by 50 IMPs and feel hard done by, but that was how we felt after losing in the Gold Cup yesterday. Our opponents, Mike, Ian, Iain and Paul probably felt that they had a comfortable win as they built a lead and saw it through, and this was how Harry and Finlay felt until we went through the results.

The first set finished 3-6 IMPs, but Alex and I had missed a chance to beat a game contract. In the second set both our pairs missed thin (against the odds) games bid in the other room, so we lost the set 16-23 IMPs (if both the games fail, there is a swing of 32 IMPs to us).

We lost the third set by 6-28 IMPs. Our destiny was largely in Finlay's hands here when Paul and Iain bid to a silly 4♠ contract. It should go down 3, but Fin's 'reasonable on the bidding' defence left him on a guess and the contact made - another swing of 20 IMPs to them.

And there was the fourth set. Mike and Ian had a long relay auction on the first hand that did not establish the trump quality and they bid a small failing slam. Then Alex and I bid a slam in hearts that needed the ace of diamonds onside, or something else good to happen, but nothing did and it went down - a fair slam, not investigated in the other room, that caused a swing of 26 IMPs. Then Alex and I bid a grand slam that only needed a 3-2 break in trumps - when trumps were 4-1, that was another swing of 25 IMPs as they had a poor auction in the other room to the small slam. Undeterred Alex and I bid another good slam missed in the other room to get 11 IMPs back, but we lost the set 24-43.

Our grand slam did have an interesting aspect to the trump suit:

	♠ ♥ ♦ ♣ A763
♠ ♥ ♦ ♣ 10		♠ ♥ ♦ ♣ J952
	♠ ♥ ♦ ♣ KQ84

In practice Mike led the ♣10 and so I just played for the 3-2 break. However if he had led something else then I should lead a small trump from the North hand hoping that Ian will play the ♣9 in order to give me a guess in how to play for a 4-1 break. In this case it would be fatal to do that.

The penultimate set started poorly when they made a doubled game. It should not have been costly but team mates went down in a poorer contract. Then Iain and Paul right-sided a good slam that was luckily missed by Harry and Finlay as they would have found the lead to beat it when it was played the other way round. We judged a couple of high level auctions better but still lost the set 9-23.

Going into the final set 65 IMPs down is not good, but we played on. Alex and I actually generated about 60 IMPs in the plus column - we caused them to miss a simple slam, bid and made two no-play games, doubled them in a making 3NT that caused them to run to 4&clubs, and bid another thin game. We did have two poor scores going down in another two thin games, but we were around +45 IMPs on the set. Unfortunately Harry and Finlay could not cover our poor scores and, in the end, we only gained 15 IMPs on the set.

So I am pretty disappointed to lose. On a different day we could easily have won by 50 IMPs ourselves.

Congratulations to Mike's team, who will play another Scottish team in the round of 16.

Summer time

Summer means the weekly Tuesday evening trip to Edinburgh for the Russell Cup. I've missed the first month due to work and will miss many other evenings due to other bridge commitments so I stand no chance of defending my title.

Partner for my first evening was Diana, Reg's Better Half. We played a solid game and emerged with 53%, missing some chances but getting a few gifts. Like everyone, we could not find a sensible way to find the best contract on this hand:

♠ AQTxxx ♥ x ♦ Ax ♣ JT9x

♠ KJxx ♥ AKxx ♦ Tx ♣ AKQ

West	North	East	South
Diana		Paul
	p	2NT	p
3♥	p	3♠	p
4NT	p	5♦	p
6♠	p	p	p

I could have broken the transfer to show a good hand, but did not want to invite complexities (like is 4♥ a retransfer?), but even if I break to 3NT it is really tough to bid the grand slam.

We did better than the field in the final round:

♠ AKJxxx ♥ xx ♦ A98 ♣ xx

♠ xx ♥ Kxx ♦ KQxx ♣ Kxxx

West	North	East	South
Diana		Paul
	p	p	1♥
2♠	p	3NT	p
p	p

The key to the auction was Diana's intermediate jump overcall of 2♠. As this would be a good suit, or compensating extra values, I thought it was worth protecting the king of hearts in 3NT. Diana had the perfect hand, especially when the spade finesse worked, and I emerged with 11 tricks. No-one else was in game and most were in 2♠, presumably after a simple overcall.

End of the season

The Berwick club closes for the summer and the end of the season is marked by the AGM.

There was a good turnout this year and the audience was treated to reports from Terry (President) and other committee members, but I think the highlight for many was Reg's Captain's Report. The Berwick A team had an excellent season in the top division, but I don't think many at the club realised how tough it was for the team - results of all the matches are analysed (by me), Reg would drop players who played poorly ... if only he had replacements available (chuckles) ... and his plan for the team to attend seminars to discuss performance prior to normal Tuesday bridge had the club's second team players rolling in the aisles. To be fair, most of the A team joined them.

After everyone had calmed down I did say, as someone who plays for another team, how impressed I was with the performance of the A team this year. To stay in the top division, avoiding relegation by the middle of the season, and being competitive in all matches was a real achievement. I think Reg's enthusiasm, if not all his emails to the team, has played a large part in the team's success.

Following the prize giving (new picture soon) there was some 'fun' bridge. Terry had prepared some goulash hands, tough enough on their own, but also introduced the rule that each player only had one call in the auction. I played with Marjorie and we only came 2nd despite getting this hand right:

♠ AK109xx ♥ ♦ AKQJ10xx ♣

West	North	East	South
p	1♣	?

What do you call?

Everyone will be back in September. Over the summer, for the addicts, there is the Russell Cup in Edinburgh or club bridge in Dunbar.

System analysis for Pau

The convention cards have been released for Pau, at least to those teams who have submitted their cards.

Systems

5-card majors: 37
4-card majors: 17
Polish Club: 4
Strong Club: 10
Magic Diamond: 1

Naturally I am doing a detailed analysis for my team, but some of the interesting facts are:

• 40 of 58 pairs are playing a multi-2D.
• 50% of the pairs are playing weak 2-suiter 2H/2S openers
• 11 of 58 pairs are using 2NT to show a weak hand with both minors

There are only a couple of pairs using Brown Sticker Conventions in the Women Series, and I expect my colleagues on the Open team will be a lot busier (not least as they have to prepare to meet every team but will only play half of them in the first round robin).

My summary is that there is nothing in these systems to cause concern, but the same can be said of our systems too.

Back home from Stratford

We had a better run in Stratford this year. A good draw meant that we missed the good teams, which was a pity, but enabled us to get through to round 6 before losing.

One of the reasons for the good draw was that many of the very good teams struggled in the event and lost lives early (and thus their seeded position). First of these was MOSSOP (#8) who was soundly beaten by the Scottish/Reading team of JOHNSTON (Sam, Stephen, David and Steve) - Sam and Stephen are coming to Vegas with us so really good to see them beating top teams, and I used to play with both David and Steve before I started blogging.

Our first round was a long triangle against COOKE (#11) and SHAPIRO (unseeded). COOKE's team contained Frances, a well known commentator on BBO and top contributor to the BBO forums, and Martin, our team mate from Brighton last year, and were clear favourites. Both of us easily beat Shapiro (we won one set by 57-4 IMPs), but Cooke held a 20 IMPs lead as we entered the last set of eight boards. We could not have asked for a better set of hands, but we were on the wrong side of all of them: there were three 23-point 3NT contracts - Harry and Finlay bid the two that failed, Martin and Jon bid the one that succeeded; Harry and Finlay bid a slam defeated by a ruff, that Martin eventually decided not to bid. So the 50 IMPs loss was actually a lot closer than it seemed and, on another day, we could conceivably have won.

Scores were COOKE (10-9, 0-19, 11-13, 7-37) and SHAPIRO (22-17, 57-4, 9-9, 35-12).

This was the start of a good run for COOKE and they would go on to lose in the semi-final by only 3 IMPs.

Having lost a life we entered the once-defeated pool. In round 3 we played GAGNE, the Welsh Seniors team for Pau, and beat them comfortably. Scores were 27-0, 17-23, 21-12, 14-7.

In round 4 we played BOSS (#19) who were on a high having just knocked MOSSOP out of the event. We played a really solid game and were comfortable winners in the end. Scores were 30-16, 20-3, 23-1, 17-24.

In round 5 we played PROBST (#28). They had just come out of the unbeaten pool having lost narrowly to De Botton and I think they suffered a lot from that setback. We only conceded IMPs on 2 boards in the first three sets and they conceded when 83 IMPs down with eight boards to play. In fact they would only have scored a single IMP in 24 boards if Finlay had seen a takeout double from Harry. Scores were 27-1, 30-12, 39-0.

In round 6 we played LANCASTER (#32). With only 12 teams left in the event this was the best draw we could have got. But, as Brian Callaghan had said when asked about his match with us, "we got an easy draw ... but the opps got an easier one!". I don't have the IMP scores as Harry took my card when we departed, but the set differences were -2, +9, -22, -17.

The Spring Fours continues to be a tremendous event and the large entry really makes a great atmosphere. Hopefully the EBU will find another seven teams next year to make it a true double-elimination event. We'll certainly be back.

I'll try to post some hands over the next few days.

Off to Stratford

It is the Spring Foursomes this weekend, the toughest event of the year. Alex and I are playing with Finlay and Harry again, hoping to improve on last year.

The entry of 57 teams is the largest since the event moved to Stratford-upon-Avon in 1992, although it is disappointing that they cannot get it up to the 64 required for a perfect double elimination.

We are seeded #22 and play a triad over the first two rounds, from which one team emerges with both lives intact with the other two losing a life.

You can follow the progress of everyone on the EBU website. The final will also be broadcast on BBO on Tuesday.