We return to France this week for the final international event of 2022, the Channel Trophy. This is a four-way competition between junior teams from England, France, Belgium and Netherlands. Each of the four countries sent three teams to Lille in northern France, Juniors (Open Under-26), Girls (Women’s Under-26) and Youngsters (Under-21). Each team will play a double round-robin of 18-board matches against the other three teams in their category. One match from each of the six rounds was broadcast live on BBO VuGraph, and we will pick out the best of the action from those matches for you. Those who have not watched much junior bridge should buckle in for the ride, as the action can be fast and furious.

As usual, we start with some problems. Firstly, with both sides vulnerable, you are West holding:

What action, if any, do you take? 

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

What action, if any, do you take?

Finally, with only your side vulnerable, you hold as North:

What action, if any, do you take?

While you mull those over, we start in the Juniors event with a match between Netherlands and Belgium, and a bidding test for the E/W pairs.

Reinder van den Weide opened his six-card suit. He heard a 1♦ response from his partner and a 1♥ intervention on his right. He then bid his second suit, which Kajetan Goscianski raised to game to produce this week’s first problem. Yes, you have excellent trumps, but the singleton in partner’s suit and your broken long suit are both perhaps reasons for caution. When Van den Weide passed, the Dutch had missed out: E/W +680. 

Emile Huybrecht (left) made his international debut in the Belgian Youngsters team at the 2017 European Youth Team Championships. I am not a fan of bidding suits out of order on this type of hand, but Huybrecht’s decision to open his five-card major worked like a dream on this combination. 

Bjorn van Velthoven responded with a 4♣ splinter bid, which was great news for opener. Huybrecht advanced with a 4♦ cue bid and, although van Velthoven then signed off in 4♠, he carried on with Blackwood and jumped to the slam once he found two aces opposite.

There was little to the play. Huybrecht won the trump lead, drew a second round, and cashed the ♦Q. With trumps 2-2 and the diamonds behaving, declarer could discard a heart and three club on dummy’s diamonds and ruff his two remaining club losers. E/W +1460 and 13 IMPs to BELGIUM, who led 35-7 at the midway point of the match,

The next deal was rather strange, in that it turned out to be a good idea not to find your huge fit.

Huybrecht opened with a Muiderberg 2♠, showing spades and a minor. With clear preference for the minor, whichever it was, Van Velthoven advanced with a pass-or-correct 3♣. When Van den Weide came in with a takeout double, Huybrecht leapt to 5♣, even though there was no guarantee that his partner had any great length in that suit. Not willing to be talked out of his good hand at these colours, Goscianski took a shot at 5♦. Although the ♥K is offside, the layout of the heart suit was favorable for declarer, so the defenders could make only one club and one heart. N/S +600.

Should Van Velthoven have taken the six-level save in clubs? As a general principle, it is a losing strategy to make such a bid when you have already made the opponents guess at a high level. However, with such a huge fit and partner marked with short diamonds, perhaps this is the exception that proves the rule. With only three losers in a club contract, saving certainly would have been right on this layout.

At the other table, the Dutch did find a cheap save, but they did so in unusual fashion:

Sander Goor (right) made his debut for The Netherlands in the Under-16 Teams at the 2017 European Youth Championships. He reached the quarter-finals of the Under-21 Teams at the 2018 World Championships and just missed out on a medal, finishing fourth, in the same event at the European Championships on home soil in Veldhoven earlier this year.  

The Dutch here were playing natural weak twos, so Tobias Westerveld had no reason to bid on the East hand. Looking at ♠A-K-x-x, it is far from obvious that Daan Hellin should take positive action on the South hand when 2♠ is passed around to him. And so it was that the Dutch found a cheap save by failing to locate their best fit. That 2♠ went four down mattered little at only 50 a trick: N/S +200 and 9 IMPs to NETHERLANDS.

I mentioned earlier that the action in junior bridge tends to be fast and furious. With that in mind, go back to the second of this week’s problem hands. 

Clovis Dehaye (left) was a member of the Belgian Junior team at the 2017 European Championships, and he played in the Under-31 Teams in Veldhoven earlier this year.

I would guess that most of you who are used to playing Leaping Michaels, would have done much the same as Dehaye did on this North hand, bidding 6♣, perhaps even with some concern that you might be missing a grand. That Daan Hellin has taken a real shine to his 6-5 8-count means that even game in clubs is reliant on the spade finesse. Had Dehaye divined that a double was right, a spade lead would have enabled the Belgians to collect +500 to win the board. The club slam, of course, suffered from a deficiency in the ace department: N/S -50.

Kajetan Goscianski (right) represented his native Poland in both the Under-21 Teams and the Under-26 Board-a-Match Teams at the 2019 World Youth Championships.

Presumably, Bjorn van Velthoven did not have a natural weak two bid available in diamonds, although one would perhaps expect most juniors to overcome that problem by pre-empting at the three-level. The Belgian player’s disciplined pass allowed Van der Weide to open 2♠ (spades and a minor) on the South hand. Goscianski inquired with 2NT, and 3♥ then showed a non-minimum with clubs. Goscianski judged to jump to game in his partner’s minor and was rewarded when the ♠K was well-placed. N/S +400 and 10 IMPs to NETHERLANDS.

On the very next deal, both North players were doubled in 3NT. The French declarer made nine tricks for what looked like an excellent +750. However, a less-inspired lead at the other table allowed declarer to rack up eleven tricks, so +1150 meant another 9 IMPs to NETHERLANDS. Who says Junior bridge isn’t exciting?

The Dutch outscored their opponents 30-28 in the second half, but BELGIUM won the match by 26 IMPs to top the leader-board in the Juniors event after the first round of matches while the Dutch propped up the field. There was better news for NETHERLANDS elsewhere, as their teams led both the Girls and the Youngsters events after the opening match. Indeed, in the Under-21 category, the Dutch lead could not have been more emphatic: they collected a maximum 20-0 Victory Points with a 102-4 thrashing of BELGIUM.

For the second round of matches, the VuGraph coverage switched to the Girls event, with a meeting of the two teams who had won their opening matches, NETHERLANDS vs FRANCE.

At both tables on this deal, the auction began with a 2♥ opening, showing a weak hand with at least 4-4 in the majors. The approach of the two West players differed significantly:

Representing France, Wilhelmine Schlumberger (left) and Constance Belloy reached the quarter-finals of the Under-26 Women’s Teams at the 2017 World Youth Championships. In 2022, they collected silver medals from that same event at the European Championships and finished fifth in the World Under-26 Women’s Pairs. 

On this deal, Belloy opened 2♥ showing a weak hand with at least 4-4 in the majors. South passed as did Schlumberger, judging that her hand was not great despite at least a partial fit in both of her partner’s suits. When North balancing 3♣ overcall came back to her, Schlumberger competed to 3♥. Now the spotlight fell on Belgium’s Mathilde Cayla. Having failed to raise clubs at her previous turn, any sort of game try was clearly not on the cards. That left, Pass, Double and 4♣.

Looking at four likely trump tricks in a heart contract, the decision to make partner the declarer in a partscore seems particularly conservative. Indeed, even allowing East to play 3♥ undoubled produces +150 as the defenders get three diamond winners to go with four trump tricks. Doubling, of, course, would increase the penalty substantially.  

East did not find the spade lead needed to legitimately hold declarer to ten tricks in her club partscore. Irene Augier won the heart lead with the ace and immediately cashed the ♥K to dispose of a spade loser from her hand. She then played a trump but, when West followed with the missing low card, she rose with the ♣K, handing back the overtrick she had been given on the lead. N/S +130.

Margaux Kurek-Beaulieu (right) and Clara Bouton were also members of the French team that won silver medals in the Under-26 Women’s Teams at the 2022 European Championships. A couple of months later, they went one better, winning the World Under-26 Women’s Pairs in Salsomaggiore.

Belgium’s Fenna Rozemond also opened with the same 2♥ bid, but Eline Samson took the exact opposite view of the West hand, raising pre-emptively to game. When 4♥ came around to Kurek-Beaulieu, she looked at her four very-likely trump winners and doubled, thus leaving her partner with the last of the problems posed at the top of this article. 

Looking at all four hands, we can see that passing the double produces N/S +800 (whether East sits or tries her luck in 4♠). However, Bouton opted for offense over defence, advancing with 4NT to show both minors. Kurek-Beaulieu retreated to 5♣ and now the destination of a substantial number of IMPs rested on Samson’s opening lead. 

When you play with fire, it is sometimes you who ends up getting burned. Having pushed her French opponents overboard, could Samson find the ♠A and a second spade that would produce a plus score and 6-8 IMPs for BELGIUM? No. She tried her luck in hearts, and now the contract was home. Declarer won and played two more heart winners to pitch dummy’s spades. She then ran the ♣8 to restrict her trump losers to one: N/S +620 and an exciting 10 IMPs to FRANCE, who led 32-15 at halftime.

After a nip-and-tuck second set on which both sides gained their share of swings, this was the final deal of the match.

This auction looks perfectly normal. Ninon Bens won the opening heart lead with the ace and led dummy’s low spade to the ace. Then came a diamond to the ace and the ♠J, run to North’s queen. Rozemond cashed the ♥K, dropping her partner’s queen, but that did not cost. She switched to a club next so Samson took three tricks in that suit and cashed her diamond winner to put the contract one down. E/W -50. 

Mathilde Cayla (left) made her international debut in the Belgian Under-16 team at the 2022 European Championships. She is the youngest player in the Girls event, with more than ten years of junior eligibility left. 

On this deal, she decided to pass her partner’s 1NT rebid, an unusual but perhaps brilliant move as it had the effect of sucking the French pair in. Bouton backed in with 2♥ on the North cards and, when that was passed around to Cayla, she now competed to 2♠. Expecting only a moderate five-card spade suit opposite and, with robust holdings in the other three suit, Augier decided that no-trumps would be a safer denomination. 

Look at things from the point of view of Kurek-Beaulieu. The auction sounds like her opponents are on very uncertain ground and she holds a surprising number of high cards with all three other players at the table bidding. Can you blame her for doubling?

Kurek-Beaulieu led the ♣A and then switched to the ♥Q at trick two. Augier won with the ♥A and immediately ran the ♠J to North’s queen. Having scored a spade trick, the defenders can defeat the contract by playing any suit except hearts, but Bouton cashed the ♥K before playing a second round of clubs. With the ♥J established as her eighth winner, declarer is now home: E/W +490 and 11 IMPs to BELGIUM.

BELGIUM just edged the second half 39-37, but FRANCE won the match by 15 IMPs to consolidate their hold on second place, just behind NETHERLANDS, who defeated ENGLAND by a similar score.

In the Juniors, FRANCE score a big win to head the table ahead of ENGLAND. In the Youngsters, FRANCE also score a near maximum and they move into the lead just ahead of NETHERLANDS. 

We will be back in Lille next week to bring you the best of the action from the next two rounds of matches.