We return to Louisville, Kentucky and the 2024 North American Spring Nationals for quarter-finals day in the Vanderbilt Knockout Teams. In a week that started unusually quietly in terms of seeds falling by the wayside, yesterday we saw the #3, #4, #5 and #6 seeds all eliminated in the Round of 16.

The two lowest-ranked teams in today’s quarter-finals are #22 CAYNE (Patricia Cayne, David Bakhshi, Bob Drijver, Ricco van Prooijen, Danny Molenaar and Tim Verbeek), who will play #14 BATHURST, and #20 ROMBAUT (Leo and Jerome Rombaut, Sabine Auken and Roy Welland), whose quarter-final opponents are #12 GOODMAN. The other two quarter-final matches pit together the four remaining teams who were originally seeded in the top 8. It is #1 NICKELL v #8 AMOILS and #2 SWITZERLAND against #7 LEBOWITZ.

The quarter-final line-up sums up the international nature of major team events at Nationals these days. There are just two all-USA teams remaining, BATHURST and NICKELL. There are representatives from ten different countries in the other six teams, with players from Ireland, Israel, Switzerland, Monaco, Denmark, Netherlands, France, England, Italy and Argentina.

The format for all matches is 60 boards divided into four 15-board stanzas.

As usual, we start with some problems. Firstly, with only your side vulnerable, you are East holding:

What action, if any, do you take?

Next, with both sides vulnerable, you are sitting in the South seat with:

What action, if any, do you take?

Finally, with only your side vulnerable, you hold this monster in East chair:

What do you bid?

While you consider those, we start in the opening set of the match between #1 NICKELL (USA) and #8 AMOILS (Canada/USA/Ireland/Israel).

Oren Toledano (left), a silver medallist as a member of Israel’s Schools team at the 2013 European Youth Championships, started with a natural, limited 2♣ opening. Ami Zamir asked with 2♦ and Toledano showed a non-minimum with a secondary diamond suit. With two top hearts and a heart ruff available to the defence, a diamond partscore is all that N/S can make, but it is perhaps asking too much to expect Zamir to pass now. When he chose to move forward by showing spade values, Toledano was perhaps lulled into 3NT.

Maybe a retreat to 4♣ would have seen the Israelis stop safely in 4♦, but I suspect they were always likely to end in one game or another from here.

Geoff Hampson had an obvious spade lead. When he eventually won with the ♠A, declarer could take four diamonds and two clubs, but he then had to concede the rest. N/S -100.

Bobby Levin (right) opened at the one-level, which created an entirely different scenario. Perhaps Irish star Tom Hanlon chose a 1♠ overcall as he did not think his hand good enough for a weak jump at adverse vulnerability, but his mere entry into the auction lit the blue touchpaper. Steve Weinstein bid his hearts and Leslie Amoils not unreasonably jumped to 4♠, presenting Levin with a tough decision.

Looking at all four hands, you can see that both sides can make only nine tricks in their respective major, so defending is theoretically the correct decision.

When Levin chose to bid on to the five-level, Amoils could have let him play there to flatten the board, but can you really blame him for doubling? That left Hanlon with the 17-IMP decision posed above as this week’s first problem.

Repeated spade leads would eventually allow West to force declarer, ensuring four trump tricks for the defence against South’s heart contract. When Hanlon pulled the double to 5♠, Weinstein was happy to double. He then led the ♣A, ensuring that the defenders had no problem scoring all four of their top winners. N/S +500 and 12 IMPs to NICKELL.

NICKELL ended the first stanza with the slimmest of leads, 23-22, but they won the second set 47-26 to open a gap that AMOILS would never close. NICKELL advanced to the semi-finals with victory by 26 IMPs, 144-118.

For the second quarter, let’s take a look at the action in the match between #12 GOODMAN (USA/Netherlands/Italy) and #20 ROMBAUT (USA/France/Denmark). The underdogs got off to a strong start and, at the end of a frantic opening stanza, ROMBAUT led by 36 IMPs, 67-31. The second stanza was just as wild, and almost 170 IMPs would have changed hands by the time we reached to mid-point of the match.

Midway through the second stanza, both South players were faced with variations on the second of this week’s problems…

The auction quickly got to the five-level. That left the key decision in the hands of Bauke Muller (left), a member of the youngest team to win the Bermuda Bowl when the Dutch lifted that trophy for the first time, in 1993. We’ve all heard warnings such as ‘the five-level belongs to the opponents’ and ‘don’t bid five over five’, but there are exceptions to every rule, and Muller judged that this was such a time.

Roy Welland doubled on the West hand and led the ♣K. He could see that he had a trump trick coming, but he knew from his partner’s signal that declarer had no more clubs. Even so, had he continued the suit for declarer to ruff, East’s heart pips would eventually have been just good enough to produce a third defensive trick.

When Welland instead switched fatally to a diamond at trick two, dummy’s jack forced East’s ace. The defence made the ♠K but dummy’s ♦K now provided a parking place for declarer’s fourth heart. A massive N/S +850.

They didn’t know it, but the French were on a damage limitation exercise at this table. The winner of numerous medals in a long career as a junior international, Leo Rombaut (right) has become a vital component in the long-term plan to return the French national team to serious contenders at major events.

After a similar auction, he was left with the same options as Muller had faced at the first table. His decision to defend was theoretically right, as we have seen that 5♠ can be beaten. However, this game has a habit of kicking you in the rear, and it is easy to go from hero to zero in the blink of an eye.

Daddy Rombaut led a trump against Mike Passell’s 5♣-Doubled. Declarer won with the ♣Q and called for dummy’s spade, on which Leo played low. It looks like a strange decision not to take the ♠A and, doing so would have simplified the later defence, but ducking was not in itself fatal.

Winning with the ♠K, Passell ruffed his remaining spade in dummy and then rumbled a few rounds of trumps. At trick eight, declarer crossed to the ♦A and led a low heart off the dummy. This is where the fatal error came, as Leo rose with the ♥A. Declarer ruffed and exited with a low diamond. Jerome Rombaut won with the ♦10 but was then endplayed, forced either to give declarer a trick with the ♥K or to lead away from his ♦K-J and allow declarer to score his eleventh trick with the ♦Q. N/S -750 and a massive 17 IMPs to GOODMAN.

GOODMAN won the second stanza 51-20, which left ROMBAUT with just a 5-IMP lead, 87-82, at the mid-match break. A big third set then gave GOODMAN a 26-IMP lead going into the final stanza and, although there was something of a comeback, it was not enough. GOODMAN advanced with a 17-IMP win, 149-132.

For the third quarter, we join the match between #2 SWITZERLAND and #7 LEBOWITZ (USA/Argentina/Denmark). LEBOWITZ won the first stanza 43-28, but SWITZERLAND came back to win the second 51-24, so they led by 12 IMPs at the midway point. The underdogs can count them selves a little unlucky on this deal from early in the third stanza…

Sjoert Brink opened what I would call a routine weak 2♦ in first seat non-vulnerable. Dennis Bilde (left) doubled in the pass out seat, and then had to answer the last of this week’s problems when Agustin Madala jumped to 3♠. Bilde’s choice of a pick-a-slam 5NT does not seem unreasonable. Madala responded with a 6♦ cue-bid to say that he had just about exactly what he had already shown, so Bilde chose slam in no-trumps.

Had spades broken no worse than 4-2, declarer would have had twelve top tricks. The 5-1 spade break left him with only eleven, and nowhere to go for a twelfth. An unlucky E/W -100.

Zack Grossack did not open the South hand, which allowed Jacek Kalita (right) to open with a multi-way Polish Club in fourth seat. Grossack overcalled 1♦ and Michal Klukowski advanced with a 1♥ transfer, showing at least four spades. After Kalita’s jump to 2NT, showing a balanced 18+, Klukowski transferred to show his fifth spade and then offered a choice of games with 3NT. Kalita had values to spare, so he continued with a quantitative 4NT, but Klukowski was minimum for his bidding so far, so he had an easy pass.

The same 11 tricks here too: E/W +660 and 13 IMPs to SWITZERLAND.

They dominated the third stanza, winning it 51-1 and just about killing off the match as a contest. The double Bermuda Bowl winners marched on into the semi-finals with victory by 168-99.

We conclude our coverage of the quarter-final stage with the match between the lowest remaining original seed, #22 CAYNE (USA/Netherlands/England), and #14 BATHURST (USA). BATHURST won a dull opening stanza 11-7 and they led 54-22 after two sets. However, the third stanza was a whitewash, with CAYNE winning it 30-0, so they trailed 52-54 with just 15 boards remaining. Although this was the lowest-scoring match of the day, there was plenty of action in the final stanza and the lead seemed to change hands every couple of deals. This bidding test for the E/W pairs provided the winning team with twice as many IMPs as their eventual margin of victory…

Although this may look like a normal Stayman auction, both 2♣ and 2♥ were alerted, so it is unclear exactly what had been shown at that point. Bob Drijver (left) advanced with 2NT, a transfer to clubs and then showed his shortage with 3♠. With West having said nothing about his club holding, but a certainty of spade wastage opposite, it is easy to see why Drijver took the conservative route and settled for game when his partner could offer no enthusiasm. With such good clubs and only a single spade stopper, should Ricco van Prooijen perhaps have done more?

The hands fit like a glove, even down to the ♥J, so there were 12 top tricks. E/W +690. Maybe it is just an unbiddable superfit - I’ll leave you to judge.

This may look like a very efficient auction, but it is possible that they were not on particularly firm ground during the auction.

After Tim Verbeek’s 2♦ intervention, showing either major, Jing Liu jumped to 3♠, clearly intended as a transfer to clubs, although it was apparently described as natural and game-forcing on the other side of the screen.

After his partner’s 3NT, Liu continued by bidding his suit, and Hongji Wei (right) co-operated with a 4♥ cue-bid. When Liu then advanced with 4NT, Wei was aware that there might be some confusion, so he tried 5NT in the expectation that his partner would clarify what was happening. Liu duly retreated to his long suit, and they had landed in an upright position in a playable slam.

Danny Molenaar opened the ♠A, and declarer was soon claiming twelve tricks. E/W +1370 and 12 IMPs to BATHURST.

Having begun the final stanza with a 2-IMP lead, BATHURST won the set 41-37 to win the match by 6 IMPs, 95-89.

The semi-final matchups are #1 NICKELL v #12 GOODMAN and #2 SWITZERLAND v #14 BATHURST.

We will be back soon with the highlights from those two matches.