BBO Vugraph #169

Welcome back to Madeira and the 55^th European Teams Championships. Despite a loss to Israel in Round 26, the Dutch still led the Swiss Bermuda Bowl winners by 33.42 VPs with just three matches to play. However, those two teams met head-on in the last match of the penultimate day of the championship. This week, in our final visit to Madeira, we will see the best of the action from that meeting and from a key match in deciding who would claim the qualification places for next year’s Bermuda Bowl in Morocco. 

As usual, we start with some bidding problems. Firstly, with neither side vulnerable you are South holding: 

What action, if any, do you take? 

Next, with only the opponents vulnerable, you hold as East: 

What action, if any, do you take? 

Finally, with neither side vulnerable, you are North holding: 

What action, if any, do you take? 

While you mull those over, we begin with the much-anticipated rematch of the Bermuda Bowl final from Salsomaggiore, where the Swiss had won by a single-digit margin. Things were very different coming into this meeting, with the Dutch holding a big lead and the Swiss needing something close to a blowout to even give themselves a chance of winning the title. The match started explosively, with both South players facing a variation on the first of this week’s problem hands above. 

Louk Verhees’s answer to the problem was to essay 3NT. Sjoert Brink led the ♦10, declarer winning with dummy’s ♦A and leading a low spade. Bas Drijver hopped up with the ♠K and switched to his club, covered by six, ten and queen. A second low spade went to the ten, jack and queen, and Brink accurately cashed his ♣A before exiting with the ♦4. Verhees captured the ♦J with his king and could cash the ♣K, but the defence already had three tricks and his only route to dummy’s winners was in hearts. That meant that East scored the ♥K and cashed his diamond winner for the fifth defensive trick. N/S -50. 

The auction began in similar fashion in the replay. 

The only real difference at this table was that Piotr Gawrys did not double 3♣ on the North hand. That, however, did not deter Michal Klukowski from choosing defence over offence. When West’s 3♣ came around to him, he doubled and Gawrys passed.  

The defence was deadly accurate, Gawrys starting with the ♠A and a second spade. Declarer won in dummy and played a trump to his ace and a low trump to North’s ♣Q, but Gawrys continued with a third round of spades, enabling Klukowski to score his small trump. Klukowki then cashed his ♣K and exited with the ♦K and a diamond to his partner’s ace. A fourth round of spades left declarer to lead a heart to the king and the defenders collected two more tricks in that suit: N/S +800 and 13 IMPs to SWITZERLAND to start the match. 

Towards the end of the match, both East players found themselves with the second of this week’s problems: 

East’s 1♦ response showed any 0-6, diamonds, or various balanced hands. When South’s 1♥ overcall came back to him, Berend van den Bos reopened with 2♣. Joris van Lankveld converted to diamonds, and there matters rested. Declarer made nine tricks: E/W +110. 

After an identical start, Bas Drijver re-opened with a takeout double for the Swiss. Although the opponents were only at the one-level, Sjoert Brink was quite happy to convert his partner’s double for penalties. There were two clubs, three diamonds and a spade to be lost in addition to three trump tricks: E/W +800 and another 12 IMPs to SWITZERLAND, who won the match 67-14, which translated into 19.43-0.57 VPs.  

Going into the final day, the Dutch lead had shrunk to a miserly 11.56 VPs, having been more than 40 earlier in the week. Just to make matters that much more interesting for the neutrals watching, on the final day both teams had to play Italy, who were battling Norway for the bronze medals. 

We will come back to that later, but first we take a look at action from a match featuring two teams trying to ensure their place in next year’s Bermuda Bowl. Meeting in Round 28, Poland was lying fifth, 19 VPs ahead of ninth-placed Lithuania, and Ireland were sixth, 18 VPs clear of the dreaded bubble. Having battled hard for 10 days, the most important task for both teams was now to avoid a heavy loss on the final day. The large crowd watching live on BBO VuGraph did not have to wait long for the first swing to come along: 

Hugh McGann opened a two-way 1♣ (11-13 balanced or any 17+) and rebid 3♠ over Tom Hanlon’s negative double of West’s 2♥ overcall. The partnership was now effectively locked into spades, so reaching the making 6♣ was virtually impossible from here. A couple of four-level cue-bids followed, but McGann gave up when Hanlon could not advance beyond game. There was a heart and a spade to lose: N/S +450 looked like a good result, but for which team? 

Konrad Araszkiewicz opened with a Polish Club and then, in the same position as McGann at the other table, made a jump cue-bid of 4♥ at his second turn. Krzysztof Kotorowic advanced with 4NT and Araszkiewicz ended the auction with a jump to 6♠. The Poles had reached the right level, but in the wrong suit: N/S -50 and 11 IMPs to IRELAND. 

Towards the end of a close match, both North players were confronted by the last of this week’s problems: 

I confess that I do not understand the logic behind passing on this North hand over West’s 1NT. For the Irish, 2♦ would have shown spades and another suit, and perhaps a 3♦ overcall would be purely pre-emptive and show much less. Even so, the jump  to 3♦ does look like a more attractive option than allowing the opponents to exchange vital information at the two-level. The Poles duly found their heart fit via Stayman and, when Hanlon then bid 3♦ at his second turn, East had an easy raise to 4♥. Of course, McGann would surely have bid 5♦ on this South hand whenever North intervenes. Neither Pole was willing to risk the five-level, so they settled for the meagre penalty on offer: just E/W +100. 

In the replay, Krzysztof Kotorowicz was much more adventurous: 

t was just about impossible for Adam Mesbur to steer the Irish pair to their cold game after the Polish North’s intervention. Indeed, the Irish had to defend accurately in order to avoid conceding a game. Mesbur kicked off with the ♠A and then switched to the ♣9. Nick Fitzgibbon won with the ♣K and, after a great deal of thought, cashed the ♠K. When he then played the ♣A next, Mesbur followed suit with the ♣8 and Fitzgibbon played a third spade, thus at least garnering a plus score. E/W +50 and an exciting 2 IMPs to POLAND. 

POLAND won the match 28-17, which meant that both teams remained in the positions where they had started the day. The most important difference, though, was that the Irish were now 24 VPs ahead of ninth-placed Denmark, and thus a place for both Poland and Ireland at the 2023 Bermuda Bowl in Morocco was guaranteed. No doubt there would be plenty of both vodka and Guinness consumed in the bars of Funchal that night, but I’d wager that the black stuff was flowing before I had even finished typing my report for the final Bulletin. 

In the battle for the gold medal, the Netherlands 43-40 win over Romania in the day’s opening match was enough to keep them in first place, but with a lead of only 4.14 VP over the Swiss, who had hammered Italy. In the final match, it was Switzerland vs Italy and Netherlands vs Bulgaria. On the second board of the match, Italy gained a 13-IMP swing when their declarer made 3NT whilst a better opening lead defeated the same contract in the replay, Meanwhile, on the same deal, the Swiss went plus in both rooms to gain 8 IMPs and move 1.69 VPs ahead of the Dutch. The Dutch then gained 6 IMPs and 1 IMP on the next two boards to move back ahead by 0.11 VPs and, as it turned out, it was a lead they would not relinquish again. 

An attack of killer bees (I kid you not – well, maybe not killers, but bees) meant that the Italy/Dutch match had to be moved out of the VuGraph room at this stage and thus those watching on VuGraph could only keep track of events via the running scores that were posted after each deal.   

Bulgaria went down in slam on the final board of their match, handing the Swiss a 4-IMP win but, after the bee episode, the Dutch still had six boards to play in their match. They could afford to lose 18 IMPs over those six boards. The boards clicked slowly by and Italy managed to claw back 8 IMPs, but a 39-38 Dutch victory meant that they had won the title with 3.25 VPs to spare.  

Who would ever have thought it would be so close when the Dutch held a two-match advantage just a couple of days earlier? Not that the huge mass of Orange supporters who had shouted on their team during the 11-day coverage on BBO VuGraph cared about the margin on victory. Congratulations to the 2022 European Open Champions, THE NETHERLANDS: Louk Verhees, Ricco van Prooijen, Bauke Muller, Bas Drijver, Berend van den Bos and Joris van Lankveld. 

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