All News

Daily Bridge in New Zealand

Kiwis on top in Trans Tasman Challenge

The second round of the Trans- Tasman Challenge took place last Friday evening and produced another good set of results for the 8 New Zealand teams. All 8 New Zealand teams recorded victories, the biggest 19.31 coming from the Cornell team over the Australian Youth Team. The top 9 out of 16 teams are:

         

Latest

 

Opponent

   
         

result

       

1

 

Terry

33.61

 

16.88

 

Aus Tobin

   
                   

2

 

Cornell

33.13

 

19.61

 

Aus Youth

   
                   

3

 

Skipper

28.91

 

12.03

 

Aus Seniors

   
                   

4

 

Aus Mixed

27.71

 

7.71

 

Livingston

   
                   

5

 

Fisher

26.08

 

13.28

 

Ewart

   
                   

6

 

Carter

22.39

 

10.91

 

Aus Women

 
         

 

       

7

 

NZ Youth

22.37

 

10.61

 

Aus Under 26 Women

                   

8

 

Livingston

21.68

 

12.29

 

Aus Mixed

   
                   

9

 

Aus Seniors

18.58

 

7.97

 

Skipper

   

 

The following board caused problems for most of the North-South pairs. In most of the matches, South was faced with how to advance the auction after their left-hand opponent started with either a Weak 2 in hearts or a Multi-Coloured 2Diamond-small opener, holding:

Bridge in NZ.png nz map.jpg

     

West Deals
None Vul

 

N

W

 

E

S

   
 

A 10 8

A K Q 6 5

K J 10 9 7

 

West

North

East

South

2 

Pass

2 

?

The main choice was to double 2Heart-small for take-out or to bid 4NT for the minors. The latter could have brought the better reward though the difficulty then was in North believing their partner was that strong. However, even being in 5Diamond-small worked out better for those who passed out the take-out double…and really, North had nowhere attractive to go:

West Deals
None Vul

K 9 6

K 8 7 5 2

8 7 4 2

A

3 2

A J 10 9 6 3

10

6 4 3 2

 

N

W

 

E

S

 

Q J 7 5 4

Q 4

J 9 3

Q 8 5

 

A 10 8

A K Q 6 5

K J 10 9 7

 

West

North

East

South

2 

Pass

2 

?

The North players did not feel like bidding 3Diamond-small, even if it was Lebensohl, showing about the value they held. That would have made it easy for South to bid to the small slam. 4NT from South immediately produced 5Diamond-small and there matters rested. The only interest in diamond contracts was in whether North would make 12 or all 13 tricks.

Ruff, testing trumps(perhaps 2 rounds) and then taking a view on how quickly the Club-smallQ would fall. An incorrect guess would not be critical unless one was in the unlikely grand-slam.

Only 3 pairs reached the slam…and only two after opposition bidding. One had the advantage of an agreement where 4Heart-small from South showed a strong hand with both minors.

However, at 5 tables, the final contract was 2Heart-smallx by West or by East after the “Multi 2”. After the lead of Club-smallA (or a high diamond where East was declarer), the defence continued with diamonds, West ruffing the second round. Declarer was now assured of 4 trump tricks, a fifth for sure if North scored a club or spade ruff. By playing on clubs, West could eventually get to ruff the fourth round of clubs in dummy to be only down 2, -300.

Tom and Steph Jacob 21.jpg 
Sitting, North- South, Tom and Steph Jacob saw West open 3Heart-small. Tom passed Steph's take-out double and the +800 they collected was very adequate compensation for the missed slam. 

North has to realise this possibility early in the defence, switching to hearts twice, to give their partner 4 club tricks, at least chalking up +500. It seems counter-intuitive to do this when you hope to use your own trumps for ruffing.

Round 3 of the competition is on Friday May 10th. Currently, the total vp score is New Zealand 199.93 Australia 120.07.

Richard Solomon

 The 16 teams are: 

NZ Carter

J Patterson, K Davies, J Millington, B Jones, P Carter, J    Atkinson

2

NZ Cornell

K Kerr, A Ker, S Henry, A Henry, S Jacob, T Jacob, M Cornell, V Cornell

3

NZ Fisher

J Simpson, S Simpson, J James, L Fisher, B Fisher

4

NZ Humphries

E Horsman, B Grover, L Cartner, J Westoby, A Tarbutt, D Humphries, D Dolbel

5

NZ Livingston

I Berrington, G Tuffnell, J Miller, G Stout, M Mayer, P Livingston

6

NZ Skipper

A Somerville, M Genc, P Newell, A Russell, J Skipper, J Skipper, R Solomon, A Grant

7

NZ Terry

K Terry, J Pawson, H Mcalister, D Mcalister, J Cormack, G Jarvis, M Wu

8

NZ Youth

L Zheng, T Pan, Y Qi, Z Werder, A Dravitski

9

AUS Ewart

N Ewart, I Robinson, K Morrison, C Hughes, D Beckett

10

AUS Free

T Fuller, M Leybourne, D Munro, G Brahma, C Belonogoff, V Nasta

11

AUS Mixed

A Korenhof, D Beauchamp, I Thomson, M Mullamphy, M Van Der Vlugt, D Neumann, E Tewes, J Tutty

12

AUS Seniors

P Lavings, R Krochmalik, A Braithwaite, A De Livera, G Lorentz, S Burgess

13

AUS Tobin

J Mott, M Scudder, J Tobin, R Tobin, J Hoffman, P Chrichton, A Spooner

14

AUS U26 Womens

L Morgan, A Davey, J Skeate, K Macdonald, Z Ross

15

AUS Womens

D Hudson, D Fryda, P Hooykaas, P Rankin, S Humphries, J Brake, J Reynolds

16

AUS Youth

T Libman, J Luke-Paredi, J Reid, S Wright, B Morgan, A Goss, G Bartley

 

Go Back View All News Items

Our Sponsors
  • Tauranga City Council
  • TECT.jpg