Vugraph Deals #156

Marc Smith visits the first heat of the Alt-‘22 

After the excitement of the first post-COVID face-to-face World Championships, we return to online bridge this week, and the opening heat of the new Alt-’22 competition, which will be staged over eight heats and a finale event during the course of the year.  

The format for this opening heat is a 24-team, eight-match Swiss, with the top eight teams earning eligibility for a place in Group A of heat two. Many of the leading teams from the 2021 competition were back, including MOSS, BLACK, LEBOWITZ, SELIGMAN, EDMONDS and HARRIS. Notable absentees from this opening heat include DE BOTTON and FREDIN, but I am sure they will return to the competition later in the year. 

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

What action, if any, do you take? Next, with neither side vulnerable, you are South with: 

What, if anything, do you open? 

Finally, with only the opponents vulnerable, you are sitting West with this collection: 

What action, if any, do you take? 

While you consider those, we start the ball rolling with a Round 1 match featuring two of those top returning teams. A seriously one-sided battle saw LEBOWITZ (USA, Denmark, Sweden, Norway) really lay down a marker as serious contenders. Two members of their Scandinavian contingent demonstrated their ability to walk on water on our first deal: 

Bulgaria’s Eddie Malhasyap chose to rebid 3NT at his second turn, and Jonathan Harris understandably saw no reason to disturb that contract. A club lead would have made things easy for declarer, but Agustin Madala fished out the ♥6. Declarer played low from dummy and chose to take North’ ♥10 with the ace. He then immediately started spades, playing the king and a second round to the ace, before leading a low club from dummy. Dennis Bilde may have been born in the morning, but it wasn’t just 24 hours earlier, so he stepped up with the ♣A and the defenders duly cashed three hearts and the ♠Q to put the contract one down. E/W -50 and I’ll leave you to decide for yourself whether declarer has taken the optimum line of play. 

After the same start, Fredrik Nystrom advanced with 3♥, showing a stopper and suggesting club weakness. That was sufficient information for Geir Helgemo to realize that diamonds was likely to be a safer game contract than no-trumps. Nystrom continued with 4♥, showing a club control, and Helgemo co-operated by cue-bidding in spades. Nystrom now decided that he was willing to play slam facing slam facing two key-cards, so out came the Blackwood club. 

The defence started with a club to the ace and a heart switch. Declarer won with the ♥A and drew trumps in two rounds. Slam is not a great proposition as, with three heart losers to dispose of, declarer needs to find either ♠Q-x or ♠Q-x-x in the South hand. However, I am sure I am not the only one who has noticed that when you are playing well, you also tend to get the rub of the green. Nystrom cashed the ♠K and played a second spade to dummy’ jack. The finesse won and the remaining spades fell under the ace, so away went all of declarer’s heart losers. Easy game, isn’t it? E/W +920 and 14 IMPs to LEBOWITZ, whose 80-14 victory rocketed them to the top of the leader-board after the first match. 

LEBOWITZ would play the multi-national ROIKO (Slovakia, USA, Canada, Portugal, Netherlands) in Round 2, whilst third-placed MOSS (USA, Netherlands, Poland) would take on the dangerous ULI (Austria, Italy). A number of North players faced this week’s first problem hand: 

The first three positive bids were the same at many tables. Roger Lee passed West’s 5♣ intervention, and no one else had anything to contribute. Lee understandably failed to find the ♦A lead, which would have enabled the defenders to save the overtrick, leading instead a top spade. Declarer ruffed, drew trumps and played on the red suits, losing only to the ♦A: E/W +420. 

In the replay, Walter Schuster chose to compete to 5♠ after the same start. Perhaps Bauke Muller was going to raise to slam no matter what North did. We’ll never know, but if there was any doubt in Muller’s mind it was removed by North’ 5♠ bid. North doubled on the way out and even made the play much more exciting by leading the ♦A, South following with the ♦5 and declarer with the ♦9. However, Schuster could not read the diamond position, so he tried to cash a top spade next. Declarer was soon claiming: E/W +1090 and 12 IMPs to MOSS.  

In the other top match, one of these results was duplicated although the auction tempo was slightly different as South jumped only to 3♠, rather than to game: 

Here, Zack Grossack was able to overcall at the four-level. Silvano Rojko raised spades to game and Michael Rosenberg’s competitive raise to the club game ended the brief auction, again a level lower than E/W might have preferred. E/W +420 when North led a high spade. 

After the more familiar start, Agustin Madala also competed to 5♠ on the North cards. Here, too, Rob Walker carried on the 6♣. When this came back to Madala, though, he decided to take the ‘red’ save. Argentina’s Alejandro Bianchedi had to lose three hearts and a club, so the sacrifice would have saved 3 IMPs had their teammate made +920 at the other table. As it was, E/W +800 was 9 IMPs to ROIKO. 

The ROIKO v LEBOWITZ match ended in a 26-26 tie. That meant that MOSS, who won 67-22, and BLACK, who defeated RED TRUTLE (English Juniors), overtook them both to fill the top two places after two matches. That set up a Round 3 meeting between the most successful team in the first half of last year’s Alt competition and the team that dominated the latter heats of the event. It turned out to be a wild set of deals, and none more so than Board 11, where every South player was confronted with the second of this week’s problems. 

Although the Netherlands is the spiritual home of the aggressive pre-empt, opening this South hand was too rich even for Bauke Muller. (We were juniors together a few moons ago, so perhaps he is just getting old.)  After his partner had started with a takeout double and then been doubled at the five-level in the suit where Muller was void, the two-times Bermuda Bowl winner and double Olympiad gold medallist decided there just had to be a better contract than 5♣-X. And, how right did that judgement prove to be? West doubled and led a spade, but Muller won, played a trump, and claimed eleven tricks: N/S +550.

Andrew Black had no qualms, and kicked off proceedings with a three-level pre-empt. Jacek Kalita came in with a cue-bid, showing both majors, and David Gold tried Blackwood on the North cards. Michal Nowosadzki competed to 5♠ and, with no defence at all, Black took a two-way shot at 6♦. Nowosadzki doubled conventionally on the way out, showing precisely one defensive trick. Armed with that information and looking at the ace of trumps, Kalita had every reason to suspect he should defend, and his heart lead made certain of a plus score for the Polish world champions. N/S -100 and 12 IMPs to MOSS, who won the match 62-11 who took a sizable lead at the top of the standings. 

In the match between EDMONDS and BRIDGE24.PL MIXED, the Rimstedt brothers collected +100 defending 6♦. At the other table, where a Polish Civil War enactment was in progress, there were a whole bunch of World and European junior championships between the players, not to mention a couple of Bermuda Bowl wins versus the current European Womens champions. 

The irrepressible Michal Klukowski came up with yet another solution to the problem of what to open on the South hand, choosing an imaginative 2♥, showing hearts and a minor. The auction quickly escalated and, when Klukowski volunteered his second suit in competition at the five-level, Piotr Zatorski can hardly be blamed for thinking he was worth a raise. 

Anna Sarniak kicked off the defence with the ♦A and, clearly not anticipating such extreme shape in the South hand, she switched to the ♣J at trick two. Klukowki took dummy’s two high clubs and ruffed a third round. He then took the spade finesse successfully. The marked ruffing finesse against East’ ♣Q now set up enough discards to take care of declarer’s remaining three heart losers. A spectacular N/S +920 and 14 IMPs to EDMONDS. 

The penultimate board of Round 4 created numerous swings around the room. A number of West players had to deal with this week’ final bidding problem. 

America’s Hua Yang was faced with the bidding problem at this table and, whilst perhaps it looks automatic to save in 4♠, is that really likely to be the right decision? How many of partner’ losers do you think you are likely to cover? A it happens, with trumps breaking 2-2, you take care of two losers, with third round ruffs in clubs and hearts, which just holds the penalty in 4♠ to an acceptable level. The defenders have two top winners to cash in each of the side suits: N/S +500. 

Tom Reynolds started with a Strong Club and Dennis Bilde came in with a 1♦ overcall. Lance Kerr’s double was semi-positive and allowed Agustin Madala to get his spades in at the one-level. Having already overcalled on the West hand, Bilde was never tempted to bid more than a pre-emptive 3♠. Kerr’s 4♥ thus ended the auction, and now it was up to Reynolds to try to bring home his game. 

Bilde led the ♦Q and declarer won in dummy, played a diamond to his king, and then a third round of diamonds, pitching a spade from dummy. East threw a club and Bilde switched to a trump to the ten and king. Declarer now played his last diamond, throwing dummy’ second spade, East again shedding a club. Bilde continued with a second trump, dummy’s ♥9 winning. It seems that declarer can now ruff one of his spade losers in dummy and make ten tricks. However, he has transportation problems. He played a club to hand and ruffed a spade, but dummy now had only clubs left. When declarer attempted to get back to his hand with his second club winner, East ruffed with the ♥Q and cashed a spade for one down. N/S -100 and 12 IMPs to LEBOWITZ, who win the match by an emphatic 82-4 to climb back into second place, albeit still a long way behind the runaway leaders. 

Many E/W pairs conceded -500 in 4♠-X and in some matches that score flattened the board. Ten declarers played the deal in 4♥, but only one managed to make a plus score. There are two ways it can be done. Reynolds’ line was okay but, after winning the first round of hearts, and before playing the last diamond, he must cash the two top clubs from his hand. That would then allow him to return to hand with a club ruff to draw East’s last trump in the endgame. The one successful declarer, 1992 European Junior champion Federico Primavera for the Austrian/Italian team ULI, made an easy 12 tricks. He won the opening diamond lead in hand, cashed the ♣A-K and, when the queen fell, followed by cashing the two top hearts. He then crossed to dummy with the ♦A and led winning clubs. East had to follow to the third round and ruffed the fourth but, by then, declarer had discarded his spade losers. A diamond ruff and another winning club then took care of declarer’s remaining losers. 

After four matches, at the midway point of this heat, the top of the leader-board looked like this: 

We will be back next week with the best of the action from the remaining four matches in this heat.