Vugraph Deals #138

Marc Smith visits the final rounds of Heat 10 of the Alt New-Co

This is the last monthly heat of the 2021 Alt New-Co before the Finale event. In Group A, the teams that finished in the top two places in Heat 9 are still serious contenders after seven matches in Heat 10. BLACK, the current champions, had also twice finished in second place earlier in the year, whilst FREDIN have also had one win and two second-place finishes and are seeking their fourth consecutive Top Two finish. Evenly matched, both teams have five wins and two losses so far in this heat, with FREDIN picking up a narrow victory in the head-to-head meeting in Round 4.

After seven matches, the standings in Group A look like this:

It is looking like a three-way battle for the title, and a three-way struggle to avoid relegation.

Elsewhere, BRIDGE24.PL MIXED (Poland) leads Group B ahead of PARSLEY (France), whilst THE MAGICIANS (Turkey) and KRUSE’S CARDCIRCUS (Denmark) head Group C.

As usual, we begin with some problems for you to consider. Firstly, with just the opponents vulnerable, you are North holding:

What action, if any, do you take? 

Next, with just your side vulnerable, you hold as West:

What do you bid?

Finally, with neither side vulnerable, you are sitting West with:

What action, if any, do you take?

While you consider those, we start with the Round 7 meeting of the two leading teams, where Board 10 presented a challenge in both the bidding and the play. 

The South hand here is a terrible combination for natural systems. If you open 2♣, you find yourself at an uncomfortably high level before describing even half of your hand. As the English pair here found out, though, opening 1♣  probably means you will never get across quite how strong you are. Not that their methods helped.

Andrew McIntosh opened 1♣ and then reversed into diamonds at his second turn. Most expert pairs these days play some form of the Blackout convention, so that all very weak hand go through a Lebensohl-type relay (usually the lower of either 2NT or the fourth suit). Optimally, you should play all other bids as game-forcing. Tom Paske had a choice at his second turn: rebid his decent six-card major, or show three-card support for his partner’s known five-card minor. The problem was then exacerbated by their agreement was that 2♥ was forcing for only one round, rather than to game. This meant that Tosh did not have a forcing 2NT bid available at his third turn, over which Paske could then have shown his club fit. He therefore had to jump to 3NT, but would be not have also followed this same sequence with close to an ace less? Paske was thus left to decide whether to pass 3NT or to advance with 4♣. Passing turned out to be a poor decision, with slam in three different denomination cold, if played from the South seat with the diamond tenace protected.

McIntosh won the spade lead in hand cheaply and could have set up the hearts for 12 tricks. He instead opted to take two diamond finesses, so ended with just eleven tricks when they both failed: N/S +660.

Jodie Edmonds chose to open 2♣ and Joel Wooldridge decided against confusing matters by making a positive response. When he then agreed trumps by raising clubs at his second turn, the partnership was well on its way. A couple of bids later. Edmonds installed herself in the grand slam. 

Declarer won the opening trump lead and immediately played three rounds of spades, ruffing in dummy. However, this removed a vital entry prematurely and in the end she would have finished one down even had the diamond finesse worked. N/S -300 and 14 IMPs to BLACK.

The grand slam can be made easily enough via a correct heart guess. Win the trump lead, unblock the ♥A, draw trumps ending in dummy, and cash the ♥K. The ♥J falls on the left and, when declarer then leads the ♥10 from dummy, the last low heart appears from East. Declarer must then decide whether West began with ♥J-x or ♥Q-J-x, but this is a guess that declarer should get right as it is a variation on the Principle of Restricted Choice. (When West had J-x he had to play the jack on the second round. When he started with Q-J-x he would presumably play the jack half of the time and the queen half of the time, so the odds are 2-to-1 that West began with the doubleton jack.) Successfully running the ♥10 sets up discards for declarer’s three diamond losers, with that carefully-preserved ♠K as the entry to the established winners.

However, making the grand slam would only have reduced the margin of victory. BLACK won 59-21 to remain atop the table. Meanwhile, FREDIN’s 31-30 win over RIPPEY lifted them above EDMONDS and back into second place. The Swedes were already 18 VPs behind the leaders, though, so their head-to-head meeting in Round 9 would either keep their hopes alive or lead to a premature coronation. As things turned out, the match was not close, with four of the five double-figure swings going in the same direction.

Most North players were faced with the first of this week’s bidding problems:

Bo-Henry Ek’s first round pass was the choice of exactly no other players who held the hand, and you can see why. With the opponents having already located their fit and opener having limited his hand, Ek’s delayed 3♣ overcall was far too little, too late, and their experienced opponents were surely likely to judge the hand correctly irrespective of what happened thereafter.

Andreas Westman led the ♣A and, like everyone else who started this way defending a spade contract (including the three tables where declarer had contracted for eleven tricks), he failed to find the low diamond switch that would have restricted declarer to ten tricks. Simon Hult ruffed the club continuation and played a spade to dummy’s ace, meaning that the defenders would get a trump trick, but he then subsequently started diamonds by cashing the king first, thus restricting the defence to one winner in that suit. E/W +620.  

By contrast, Tom Paske opted for the maximum pre-emptive option, overcalling 4♣ despite holding only a six-card suit. Alon Apteker made a negative double and Andrew McIntosh raised the ante to the five-level. When that came back to Apteker, he not unreasonably chose offence rather than defence (doubling 5♣ produces +300, so would have cost the Swedes 8 IMPs). 

Andrew McIntosh overtook the opening club lead with his ace and switched to the ♥J at trick two. When Peter Fredin won in hand and set about drawing trumps by laying down the ♦A, that was curtains. McIntosh now had two trump winners: E/W -100 and 12 IMPs to BLACK.

It is worthwhile looking at one more possible solution to the original bidding problem. What happened here really was case of ‘the operation was a complete success apart from the patient dying anyway’.

Canadian Paul Thurston’s solution to the problem was an Unusual 2NT overcall, showing the two lowest unbid suits, hearts and clubs. Franco Bassegio advanced with a 3♥ cue-bid, showing a game-forcing hand with spades, and one would perhaps have thought that would be problem solved, with West simply bidding game in his partner’s major. However, David Yang had a different agenda, and instead elected to take a shot at 3NT!!

“God protect me from imaginative partners,” is a sentiment that perhaps both the North and the East player may have uttered when this hand finished.

Thurston duly led the ♣K, Mike Rippey following with the ♣3 (udca). Thurston then continued with the ♣J, which Rippey took with the ♣A. I can only surmise that Rippey, rather than just assuming his partner was on the same planet as everyone else, decided that Thurston had found a curious lead of the ♣K from K-J-9-x-x, leaving declarer with ♣Qxx and ♥ Kxx. There really is no other explanation for his switch to the ♥J at trick three. A grateful David Yang won in hand, played a diamond to the king and then ran the ♠10 to pick up South’s ♠Q. That was ten tricks and E/W +630: 1 IMP to AMATEURS when E/W made +600 in 5♦ at the other table.

Board 14 presented an interesting bidding problem in one room. In the other, EW were simply shafted by circumstances, and ended up suffering an adverse game swing without anyone doing anything in the least bit abnormal. 

What to bid on this West hand after partner’s takeout double would have been a much trickier problem if East had not been a passed hand. As it was, Gunnar Hallberg settled for a gentle 2♥ on his acey 13-count. When Simon Hult then raised invitationally to 3♥, though, Hallberg obviously accepted the game try. 

Declarer ducked the opening trump lead to South’s king and won the trump return in dummy. The favourable spade position means that just about any play in that suit will generate declarer’s ninth trick. Hallberg played a spade to the ace and, when North did not cover the ♠10, ran it to South’s king. Having no third trump to play, Westman switched to the ♣K, but declarer was in control now. Hallberg cashed his high diamonds, then the ♠Q pitching the last diamond from his hand. He then scored four more trump tricks on crossruff: E/W +620.

When Andrew McIntosh decided to treat the South hand as a 15-17 notrump, East/West were in deep trouble. Peter Fredin had no way into the auction on that flat West hand. Had Thomas Paske passed the North hand, Alon Apteker would probably have balanced back in, but over the Stayman response he could say nothing. When Paske then passed the major-denying 2♦ response, what could the South African do? Paske was presumably 4-4-5-0 or (34)-5-1, but he would bid this way with 6-7 HCP as well as with a bust. The only thing Apteker knew for certain was that both McIntosh and Fredin held a club suit, suggesting that the hand would not fit well for whichever side became declarer.

The defence dropped a trick in the play, but an extra 50-point undertrick was not going to make a significant difference to the score on this board. McIntosh finished three down: E/W +150 and another 10 IMPs to BLACK.

A misunderstanding hammered the final nail into the Swedish coffin. What sort of hand would you expect from opener for his 1NT rebid in the auction 1♣-(P)-1♥-(1♠)-1NT? I confess that I agree with Peter Fredin, who raised to 3NT on his 9-count. It seems to me that 1NT in this auction should either be 18-19 balanced or a 15-17 hand that could not open 1NT because of short hearts. Alon Apteker is evidently from the other school of thought, which thinks this just shows a spade stopper in a balanced 11-14. Are you sure that you would be on the same page as your regular partner if this auction came up at your table? Worth checking!

Andrew McIntosh doubled 3NT on the way out. When the dust finally settled, declarer had managed to accrue five tricks: N/S +1100. That was another 15 IMPs to BLACK when Hult/Hallberg returned from the other table with a scorecard containing a routine +140 in 2♥ on the deal.

Their 50-19 victory ensured that BLACK would finish the week as champions, no matter what happened in their final match, With EDMONDS losing 4-51 against LEBOWITZ, FREDIN remained in second place, albeit a country mile behind the runaway leaders.

In Round 10, there were points of interest in both the bidding and the play on Board 11. First, the West players had to decide what to do on this week’s final bidding problem.

When you live by the sword, it is inevitable that you will also occasionally die by it. The same goes for pre-empts: sometimes the auction you enter is one in which you simply do not belong. Such was the case with Esteban Vallet’s 3♠ overcall on this West hand. Simon Hult was no doubt silently ruing the invention of negative doubles until, remarkably, Pierre Bedout raised his partner to game. There was nothing negative about Hult’s double now unless, of course, you happened to be French. The defence had no problem scoring four trumps tricks to accompany a winner in each red suit: E/W -500.

Andrew McIntosh was more circumspect at the other table:

After McIntosh’s disciplined pass, Paul Thurston bid spades on the North hand, thus removing any lingering temptation there might have been for West to make a later entry into the auction. Tom Paske started with a takeout double and, when South rebid diamonds and North raised the suit, he jumped to game in his long major. 

I was hoping to be able to finish this report with an example of excellent declarer play. However, Mike Rippey’s decision to lead his side’s suit, the ♦A, ended defensive hopes. Declarer had two trumps to lose, but that was all: E/W +420 and 14 IMPs to BLACK, on their way to yet another thumping victory, 51-18.

Two declarers in Group A did play in 4♥ on the more testing lead of the ♥K. For FREDIN, Alexander Sandin won the opening lead with the ♥A and immediately played the ♠A. Michael Rosenberg ruffed, cashed his other trump winner, and exited safely with a club. Declarer was therefore left with two diamond losers at the end. For EDMONDS, Ola Rimstedt got closer to the winning line, ducking at trick one and winning the trump continuation. After cashing one high club, though, Rimstedt also tried to score the ♠A, allowing South to ruff in with his trump winner and exit with a club. Again, declarer had to lose two diamonds at the end. The winning line is to win the second trump and then cash four rounds of clubs. When you then play the ♠A, it makes no difference whether South ruffs or not. If he does not, he will be thrown in with his trump winner. With only diamonds left, South will be forced to concede declarer’s tenth trick to the ♦K.

A heavy defeat in their final match, 36-78 against LEBOWITZ, dropped FREDIN out of the top two places in a monthly Alt heat for the first time since mid-Summer. The final standings in Group A were:

Elsewhere, JEDI KNIGHTS (England/Wales) earned promotion by winning Group B ahead of BRIDGE24.PL MIXED (Poland). In Group C, THE MAGICIANS (Turkey), who had led throughout, finished just ahead of KRUSE’S CARDCIRCUS (Denmark).

Next week we cross to the RAC Club in London to see the highlights of the 2022 running of the prestigious Lederer Trophy. We will then return to online play with the best of the action from Event-X, the grand finale of the monthly 2021 Alt New-Co.