We are back in the national capital, Canberra, for the Australian Summer Festival. The National Open Teams will begin in a couple of days, but the focus for now is on the playoff final which will decide who will represent Australia in the Women’s Teams at the 2024 South Pacific Championships and in the World Teams Championships at the World Bridge Games (formerly known as the World Team Olympiad), which will be held in October 2024 in Buenos Aires, Argentina.

The two finalists in the Women’s Teams playoff are JACOB (Ella Jacob, Jenny Thompson, Renee Cooper and Jane Reynolds) and LUSK (Sue Lusk, Viv Wood, Paula McLeish, Pele Rankin, Jessica Brake and Susan Humphries). We left the 96-board final with two sets remaining and JACOB leading by 14 IMPs (134-120). The VuGraph coverage switched to the final of the Senior playoff for the fifth stanza, but we didn’t miss much as LUSK won that segment 33-32 to reduce the deficit by just 1 IMP.

With all to play for over the final 16 boards, we begin, as usual, with a couple of problems. Firstly, with only your side vulnerable, you are South holding:

What action, if any, do you take?

Next, with neither side vulnerable, you are sitting in the West seat with:

Playing Lebensohl, East’s 3♣ bid is natural and showing about 8-11 HCP. What action, if any, do you take?

The match score had advanced to 169-162 in favour of JACOB when both South players were confronted with the first of the problems above.

Paula McLeish came in with a takeout double of hearts on the second round of the auction, leaving Jenny Thompson (left) to decide how much she liked her hand. The answer was clearly ‘a lot’, as Thompson did not even think it necessary to consult her partner, but she just jumped to game.

Pele Rankin led the ♠7, but that did not really give declarer anything as East’s double had made it certain that declarer would correctly guess the location of the ♠Q. Thompson won with the ♠9 and banged down the ♥A at trick two. The appearance of East’s ♥Q was music to declarer’s ears. She had to lose just a trump and a trick in each minor, but that was all: N/S +620.

In the replay, Jessica Brake decided that her hand was worth only a game try after an identical start to the auction. When Susan Humphries showed a minimum, albeit with four-card support, Brake chose to give up at the three-level.

The opening lead and the number of tricks made were the same: N/S +170 and 10 IMPs to JACOB, more than doubling their advantage to 17 IMPs.

On the next deal, both declarers played the same contract. On the surface, the fate of the contract might appear to depend on a guess, but superior technique produced a significant swing (although at this level one might have expected the board to be flat).

Renee Cooper (right) played 5♦ from the East seat and Brake led her singleton heart. Winning with the ♥A, Cooper ruffed a heart at trick two, confirming the distribution of that suit. She then drew trumps in three rounds, North discarding three hearts. Declarer cannot get a complete count of the hand, as she has no way to uncover the shape of the club suit, but she does know that North started with six black cards and South with nine. That alone makes South a 2-to-1 favourite to hold the key missing card, the ♠Q. Cooper attempted to uncover more information by playing a club at trick six. North won with the ♣6 and continued with the ♥K, declarer ruffing and playing a second round of clubs. North rose with the ace and played the ♥Q, forcing declarer to ruff again.

It was now time to broach the spade suit and Cooper duly crossed to the ♠A and ran the jack on the way back. As it happens, the defenders’ spades divided 3-3, but declarer’s original assessment based on vacant spaces was the best information she had on which to base a decision. E/W +600.

East did not open at this table, but the final contract was the same, albeit played from the other side. North led the ♥K here, meaning that the play problem was essentially the same.

Rankin won with the ♥A and cashed her three top trumps. Her next move was to play a spade to the jack. It might have been the winning play, but two-thirds of the time it will not be. Justice was duly served when South won with the ♠Q and the defenders cashed their club winners to put the contract one down. E/W -100 and 12 IMPs to JACOB. Suddenly, the lead had ballooned to 29 IMPs with only ten boards remaining.

The objective of competitive bidding is to give the opponents just enough rope to hang themselves, but not so much that they can escape out of the window. N/S achieved that objective at the first table on this deal…

Jane Reynolds (left) doubled South’s natural weak 2♥ opening. Playing Lebensohl, Renee Cooper’s 3♣ response was natural and showed some values but not enough to force to game so, typically, about 8-11 HCP. With the ♥K of dubious value, should Reynolds take another bid on her ace-less wonder? I suspect that a substantial majority on an expert bidding panel would agree with her decision to Pass, but it was not the winning choice on this layout.

Jessica Brake led the ♠J against 3♣. Declarer won in dummy and played a trump, South winning with the ♣A. The diamond switch went to North’s ace, and Susan Humphries duly delivered her partner’s spade ruff. Now Brake exited with a second round of diamonds. Cooper won and played a second trump, but North won with the ♣K, crossed to her partner’s ♥A, and scored a diamond ruff to beat the contract by two. E/W -100. So much for playing the safe partscore rather than the risky game contract.

The effect of South’s weak two opening bid was to make things difficult for her opponents. If you make the opponents guess often enough, even the best players will guess wrong some of the time. Contrast that with what happened in the replay…

After the same start to the auction, Ella Jacob competed to 3♥ on the North hand. The unfortunate result of this was to push East into what turned out to be a winning decision. Paula McLeish (right) did not have the luxury of describing her hand and thus consulting her partner. With a responsive double not a viable option, McLeish essentially had to decide whether to bid game or to defend against 3♥. With a solid heart stopper, excellent impletion, and a 10-count facing a two-level takeout double, the odds surely favour taking a shot at 3NT, which is what McLeish did.

South led a low heart. Dummy’s ♥K won and declarer set about diamonds. North took the ♦A immediately and returned a heart, South winning and clearing the suit. With the ♠J coming down, declarer had nine tricks: E/W +400 and 11 IMPs to LUSK, giving them just the faintest glimmer of hope with boards fast running out.

Susan Humphries (left) began her international career as a member of the New Zealand Junior team at the 2008 World Bridge Games in Beijing. She later represented the Kiwis at the 2016 World Championship and in the 2017 Venice Cup. A recent convert from the dark side, Humphries made her debut in the Australian Women’s team at the 2022 Venice Cup in Salsomaggiore.

Jessica Brake opened the South hand (as everyone would these days) and Humphries forced to game with a fourth-suit 2♦. Each player then made an attempt to find a fit for their six-card major and, when that search proved fruitless, they ended where this type auction usually does.

3NT is not a thing of beauty and Reynolds’ diamond lead gave nothing away. Brake won cheaply and played a heart but, when dummy’s ♥Q was allowed to win, that suit was virtually dead. Brake cashed the ♦A-K and played a club to the king. Next came the ♦Q and the ♠A. Having scored her seven obvious tricks, Brake exited with a club and hoped to make a trick in the wash. The defenders had enough winners to beat the contract, but West was eventually endplayed to concede a trick to the ♣Q at the end. N/S -50.

Jenny Thompson chose to rebid her moderate six-card suit at her second turn. When Ella Jacob (right) bypassed clubs to bid diamonds, Thompson did not like her clubs enough to commit to 3NT, so she bid her motley suit for a third time. Thus encouraged, Jacob duly raised to game in her partner’s suit.

Not that 4♥ is not a great deal better than 3NT as contracts go. However, the auction proved just enough to tempt an indiscretion out of the opposition. Although not a great holding from which to lead, Pele Rankin was attracted by the unbid suit, and that meant she selected as her opening lead the only card in her hand that would let the contract through, the ♣A. Now declarer could take advantage of the 3-3 trump split to bring home ten tricks. N/S +420 and 10 IMPs to JACOB.

This deal was the final nail in the LUSK coffin, and just about summed up how this final stanza had gone for them. JACOB won the final set by a resounding 63-22. The final margin was thus 54 IMPs (229-175) which certainly was not a true reflection of how close the contest had been right until the very end.

Congratulations to the JACOB foursome (left-to-right: Ella Jacob, Renee Cooper, Jenny Thompson and Jane Reynolds). They will represent Australia in the Women’s Teams at the major international events of 2024, in all likelihood augmented by a third pair from the team they have just beaten.

We will be staying in Canberra for a few more days, and we will be back soon to bring you the best of the action from the Australian National Open Teams.