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“Points Schmoints”

We reported yesterday on one board which contributed to the Henry team winning the National Open Teams. Today, we have another, the story being told by Jane Lennon. This board also came from the final match.  

 

“An article written by Larry Cohen in 2020 about point count misconceptions quotes his old partner Marty Bergen as coining the phrase “Points Schmoints”. I’m not sure whether this was actually the case, but the sentiment behind it is something that needs to be taken into consideration when bidding distributional hands. Cohen goes on to say in his article that point ranges are “training wheels for beginners”. The following hand from the last round of the recent National teams may have been taking this a bit far, but take a look and judge for yourself.

 

 

 

 

The auction began with a 2/1 (2+) 1 opening from South (Dave Taylor). West, Mariusz Tumilowicz, chose a double. As North I bid 1  showing 4+ spades and East (Mindy Wu) bid 2. South now bid 2 showing 11-14 and 4 card support. West competed with 3 and North, with the “points schmoints” approach to a double fit distributional hand, bid 4.

While Deep finesse says EW are entitled to 4 tricks when the contract is played by South, on a diamond lead from West, the play proceeded:

Mariusz probably felt quite happy that his partner’s bid gave him the option of a diamond lead because his hand doesn’t have a particularly attractive lead. After a small diamond lead from West ran to the Queen, Dave played two rounds of clubs. Winning the heart return, he cashed A for a heart discard from dummy.

He then played the J. West rose with the Ace and Dave ruffed the heart return in dummy. He played a club and ruffed with the 9, which was overruffed by West’s Q. Dave now ruffed another heart return in dummy, drew the last trumps with the K and claimed with the club suit being good on the table.

The board was played in 2 making 3 by East (Annette Henry) at the other table, netting the team 11 imps.

Two other tables bid to 4, Clair Miao and Wayne Burrows for the Miao team and Tony Quinlivan and Bridget Hannaway for the Edginton team. Wayne made 10 tricks on a diamond lead, but Tony unfortunately got a club lead and went one down.”

 

Yesterday saw the first day of the World Under 21 Youth Championships in Veldhoven. 

 20 countries are playing a complete round-robin of 14 board matches over 5 days to qualify 8 for the knock-out stages. The first four were played yesterday and produced some reasonable results for the New Zealand team:

Australia                      33-29             11.28

USA 2                         17-55               1.83

India                          54-22             17.34

China Hong Kong        14-40               3.62

 
  Leon and Ramon at the table

 

This board earnt New Zealand 10 imps against India:

 

3 showed a 4-card major but Zachary was only interested in clubs after Ryan denied a 5-card major. Ryan showed 3 aces and 6 was reached. Zach received a dangerous diamond lead but he could win and play 2 top trumps and three rounds of hearts discarding his diamond loser as East ruffed. At the other table, India played 3NT.

 

 

This left New Zealand in 11^th place at the end of the day. Tuesday will be a tough day for the team with 3 of the matches against countries in the top 6, Israel, Japan and France along with a match against Singapore.

We will feature hands from this event over the next few days.

 

This is the link for the Youth results:  http://db.worldbridge.org/repository/tourn/veldhoven.23/microsite/Results.htm 

 

Richard Solomon

and remember, the NZ Youth are on BBO at 10pm this evening, Tuesday, 1st August against Japan. A tough assignment for the Kiwis as Japan only dropped 3.33vps in 4 matches on Day 1. 

 

 

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