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More of Day 1's Results

It was a repeat of the first day with our Women and Mixed Teams being very much in the mix, our Open Team in midfield and our Seniors Team wishing they were!

The Open Team started with their bye and then produced a fine 15.38 win over Scotland but slumped to a 44 imp loss to one of the top teams in their group, Spain, in their final match of the day. They are currently 12^th in their 17 team group.

Matt Brown and Michael Whibley gave their Scottish pair something to think about on Board 15 of their match. The Scottish South had a fine collection:

 –

 AT43

 AK2

 AKQT63

and had bid up to 7 knowing his partner had at least KQxxx and the A. Would you bid 7NT over the opponent’s 7 sacrifice? How will the clubs break?

The Scottish South decided to take the money which was only +1100 when the key club suit broke nicely to allow 7NT to make 15 tricks!

 

Matthew and Michael had done well to get into the bidding and then judge that 7 was cold. They gave their opponents the chance to go wrong and earnt 13 imps for New Zealand when Michael Ware – GeO Tislevoll did their bit in bidding and making 7. Only 4 Open pairs out of 51 found the spade sacrifice with only one being unlucky enough to have 7NT bid over the top.

In the Women’s field, only one pair found 7 though far less East-West’s bid the grand-slam.  Indeed, a couple of North-South pairs played in spades themselves, at the 4 level… without much success!

More Success for our Women

Our Women had a good day, two wins and like Day 1 a loss at the end. They scored 18.33 off Iceland and 11.76 against China Hong Kong but then lost by 16 imps (5.82 vp) to Chinese Taipei to finish the day in a very healthy 5^th place, having just been overtaken by Chinese Taipei by 1vp.

It’s looking like a hard road for our Seniors who are 24^th and still winless at the end of Day 2. They held England to a 5 imp loss (8.30) and Turkey to a 10 imp loss (6.82) but they took only 2vps off Denmark and 0.56vp off Italy and have a tough job ahead to achieve respectability.

and for our Mixed Team too

Not so our Mixed Team which for the second day running won three out of four matches. They started with the loss by 14 imps to Japan (5.78) but then recorded 11.05 against Bulgaria, 14.22 against Poland and 13.18 against Israel to finish the day in 7^th place, only 10 vps behind the second placed team. Australia lead the way in this competition.

The following  board was flat in the Mixed match against Israel but was not the luckiest board so far for the Seniors (the Open and Women play different boards).

 

After a 4 opening from West, there would not be much chance for either side to check on aces. Both the New Zealand and Israeli Open North-South pairs bid on to 7 (x) played by North and conceded 500.

Our Seniors’ North-South got to play in 6. The 4 opening would make it wise for East to start off with the A and when West found one small trump, the contract was one down. However, their Italian opponents played the same contract from the South seat, from where 12 tricks are absolutely guaranteed.

If “it’s tough at the top”, it is even tougher down at the bottom. Here’s hoping they can record a win or two on day 3.

Richard Solomon

 

 

 

 

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