After an exciting week at the USBC Spring Nationals in New Orleans, we now return to Europe to catch the best of the action from the final of the National Men’s Teams Championship in Italy. A total of 42 teams began the three-day qualification stage. After eight rounds of matches, the top eight teams advanced to the all-play-all final. Most of the top names in Italian bridge could be found in the eight-team field. Leading at the end of the qualification stage were VINCI (Francesco Vinci, Giorgio Duboin, Fabrizio Hugony, Alfredo Versace, Lorenzo Lauria), followed by FANTONI, BURGAY and ZAMPINI.

Only one problem for you this week. With only your opponents vulnerable, you are West holding:

What action, if any, do you take?

We start our coverage in the first of the seven rounds, with the very first deal in the match between BURGAY and DE MICHELIS.

N/S at this table were the young Italians Giovanni Donati and Giacomo Percario, who we saw last week in the final of the Vanderbilt. Donati opened a Precision-style 1♦ on the North hand and Massimiliano di Franco pre-empted to the maximum with 3♠ on his junk. With a fit virtually assured, Percario ventured a negative double despite not holding the values one would normally expect for such a bid at this level. Hopeful, perhaps, that his opponents would alight in a heart contract, Andrea Manno passed to await developments. He was then faced with this week’s problem when North’s 3NT was passed back to him.

It is easy to see why Manno thought he might have enough defence to beat 3NT, so he chose to defend. He was to be disappointed: declarer won the spade lead, cashed three rounds of clubs ending in dummy, and took the heart finesse. When East could not find the ♥K amongst his riches, Donati claimed his nine tricks: N/S +600.

A correct trump guess limits declarer’s losses in a spade contract to just two hearts and one trick in each black suit, so 4♠-X would have been cheap for E/W.

After a similar start, South did not make a negative double at the other table…

F

Federico Porta (left) is one of the brightest young stars on the Italian bridge scene. He made his international debut in the Italian Under-16 team at the 2014 World Youth Championships. He was a member of the team that won the Schools Teams event at the 2016 World Championships and, more recently, he collected a silver medal in the Under-26 Teams category at the European Youth Championships last year.

North opened with a natural 1♣ here and Leandro Burgay made the same 3♠ overcall on the East cards. After South’s pass, Porta judged to up the ante to 4♠, which left North with no winning option. The best that Luca de Michelis could do was to double and collect his +100 for an 11-IMP loss. When he elected to advance with 4NT, showing diamonds and longer clubs, N/S were then booked for a minus score. South chose to play the 4-4 diamond fit and Porta expressed his opinion about the viability of the that contract with a red card.

A club lead would have enabled the defenders to score a club ruff to go along with their three natural trump tricks. That opportunity disappeared when Porta kicked off with a top trump, but the damage had already been done. N/S -200 and 13 IMPs to BURGAY to get the ball rolling for them.

BURGAY led the match 33-5 with just two boards remaining, but a late rally significantly reduced that margin and they emerged with a 33-25 win, which left them in fourth place after the opening round. The biggest win of the round went to VINCI, 36-13 against SANTOLINI, to establish the qualification winners as the early front-runners in the final.

Boards on which the pair holding less than half of the high-card points have the best chance of making a game always have the potential to create big swings. And, so it proved in the second-round meeting between FANTONI and LANZAROTTI.

Fulvio Fantoni started with a nebulous 1♦ on the North hand, and heard an artificial game-forcing 2♣ response. Now Fantoni bid his long suit, and Salvetti responded in kind. Fantoni’s 3♠ was a probe for 3NT, which allowed Montanari to make a lead-directing double. Salvetti retreated to 4♥ but, with a pair of cashing A-Ks against them, N/S were already too high.

However, Arrigo Franchi now sprang to life, taking a shot at 4♠ on the distributional West hand. Surprisingly perhaps, considering the number of high cards held by each team, this seems to be the only game contract that has a chance of making. Yes, the defence can defeat 4♠ by playing three rounds of hearts, North overruffing declarer with the ♠J whilst South still holds a natural trump winner. Perhaps Fantoni did not fancy his chances on defence or it was simply the allure of a vulnerable game bonus, but he trusted his luck to his strong seven-card suit. The good news for Fantoni was that neither of his opponents could find a double, so his ‘red save’ turned out to be a cheap one if 4♠ would have been allowed to make.

The defenders duly collected their four top tricks against South’s 5♣ contract: N/S -200.

As in life, one should always be careful what one wishes for at the bridge table, as you may get it.

Dario Attanasio started with a natural, Precision-style 2♣ on the North hand. Massimo Lanzarotti (right) inquired with 2♦ and discovered that his partner held at least six clubs but no four-card major. Perhaps Lanzarotti had a way to investigate a possible heart fit, but he settled for a simple raise to 3NT.

Moritsch opened the ♠A and Cavallari now had to make a decision. The lead was likely to be from A-K-x, so did West want his partner to continue spades, setting up his long cards in the suit as winners whilst he had the ♦A as a potential entry, or did he want his partner to switch, presumably to diamonds?

Cavallari decided to ask for a spade continuation, and Moritsch duly obliged, so a grateful declarer was soon claiming 11 tricks. Had Cavallari discouraged at trick one, the diamond switch would have netted the defence the first eight tricks and a 5-IMP gain. As it was, it was N/S +660 and 13 IMPs to LANZAROTTI.

LANZAROTTI won the match 26-15 to climb up into third place. They were just a tad behind BURGAY, who recorded their second win. However, VINCI scored a 20-0 blitz against TURLETTI and were thus already 10 VPs clear of the field after just two rounds.

In Round 3, the BBO VuGraph audience got their first look at the leaders, as VINCI took on ZAMPINI. In a curious quirk of fate, it was again the side with the minority of the high-card points that were able to make game. Was it possible to bid, though?

Giorgio Duboin (left) made his international debut in the Italian Junior team at the 1980 European Youth Championships. He then reached the knockout stage of the Rosenblum Cup at the 1982 World Championships before collecting a silver medal at the 1984 European Junior Teams. That also happened to be my first international event, so we have known each other for a long time.

Giorgio has been one of the top players in Europe over the past 30 years, winning the European Teams Championship eight times, the European Mixed Teams once, the Bermuda Bowl and Rosenblum Cup once each, and the World Team Olympiad three times.

On this deal, Duboin opened with a fairly heavy weak two bid in first seat non-vulnerable on the North cards. East doubled and Francesco Vinci made a competitive raise to 3♠. Now, having earlier pre-empted on the hand, Duboin made the unusual decision to bid on to game, even though not invited to do so. Partner’s heart shortage was just what the doctor ordered and, when the defence could not take a club ruff, Duboin had ten tricks. N/S +420 looked like an excellent result. Of course, looks can be deceiving…

Despite his questionable stopper, Lorenzo Lauria opted for a 2NT overcall of North’s weak 2♠ opening. Here, too, South raised competitively to the three-level. Alfredo Versace’s takeout double then left Lauria with a problem. Nothing was particularly attractive. With partner likely to hold heart values for his double, Lauria decided to rely on his plethora of top cards to beat 3♠-X, so he chose to defend. Declarer’s diamond void and dummy’s heart shortage meant that all those high cards were worth only three tricks in defence: N/S +630 and 5 IMPs to ZAMPANI.

ZAMPANI won a low-scoring match 14-12. In the other big match in this round, LANZAROTTI beat BURGAY 17-13 to climb ahead of their opponents into second place, narrowing the leaders’ advantage at the top.

We stay with the leaders in Round 4 as they take on another potential contender, FANTONI. Someone must have annoyed the leaders, and vengeance was swift and immediate. First, Versace/Duboin bid a grand slam off an ace that, even when the defenders found the wrong lead, still needed a finesse: that rolled home for a 17-IMP pick-up. Then came…

There was an air of inevitability about this auction, and it was no surprise when the combined 25-count with no fit ended in 3NT. With nothing lying well for declarer, it was just a question of how many down.

Fantoni led a top spade. Versace won and played a heart to the ten and queen. He ducked the spade return, won the continuation and cashed the ♥J to get the bad news in that suit. With the writing on the wall, Versace cashed his top tricks and conceded two down: E/W -200.

Fabrizio Hugony (right) made his international debut at the 1999 European Pairs in Warsaw. Over the past two decades, he has played regularly in Mixed teams and Open events, winning the Open Teams at the 2019 European Transnational Championship as part of the VINCI team. He was a member of the Italian team which reached the quarter-finals of the 2022 Bermuda Bowl in Salsomaggiore.

The auction at this table was identical up until North’s final pass. Appreciating that suits were not breaking well for declarer, an astute Hugony doubled on the way out.

The ♠Q was led and declarer ducked. Now Hugony switched to the ♦Q. With communications quickly becoming a problem, declarer won in his hand with the ♦K and ran the ♥J to South’s queen. A spade came back and declarer won.

Cavallari could not afford to cash his other spade winner, setting up two tricks for North, but neither could he afford not to do so. He tried a club to dummy’s queen, but Vinci won with the ♣K and stuck declarer back in dummy with a ♦A. Declarer could cash his two heart winners, but dummy was then endplayed, so declarer never did score a second spade trick. That was three down: E/W -800 and 12 IMPs to VINCI, who blitzed their opponents 58-8 over the 10-board match,

With four of the seven matches in the round robin final played, these were the standings:

We will be back in Salsomaggiore next week to bring you the best of the action from the remaining three matches in this final

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