T Nagar Club

You may (or may not) have noticed a slight hiatus in my bridge-blogging recently. It was probably already slowing down in May, but I haven't posted at all in June, and that's because I've been working away in Chennai India. One of the first things I did when I got here was email the local bridge club to try to organise a game. However, I only managed to get there last Tuesday (after being here for more than three weeks). In part, because the Indian National championships were on in Bangalore last week, so the local club wasn't playing their usual weekly tournaments. 

I arranged to play with Sathish by email, agreeing (with some slight apprehension) to play whatever system he chose to send me. I was somewhat relieved when he sent me something that looked pretty much like what I play usually at home, with a few minor variations (for example, a raise to 2 of a minor is 9-11 with 5 card support - I never actually got around to finding out what a raise to 3 of a minor was...), and we agreed to meet at the club on Tuesday night. 

I turned up at the T Nagar Club about 40 minutes before play was due to start (having left a lot of time for the highly unpredictable traffic), and walked into a room where about 4 full tables were already occupied with people chatting away in Tamil. As you can see from the photos above, the setting looked quite definitely Indian, but also quite definitely like a bridge club. I greeted a couple of people, told them I'd already arranged a partner, and sat down at a table to wait. After about 2 minutes of conversation in Tamil, I heard: "T854 spades, 98 hearts, AKJ3 diamonds, Q53 clubs, favourable, it goes pass, pass to you". It turns out that in India the language of bridge is English, and I was able to follow the rest of the story. 

Interspersed with a few words of Tamil, he went on to explain how his light 1♦ opener had allowed his partner to find the right lead against 4♠. They cashed the first three tricks in diamonds, everyone following, and he played the 13th ♦. With ♠A7 visible in dummy, partner only had to ruff with the ♠9, and he'd promote a trump trick in our hero's hand. We all know the end of the story - partner had the ♠9, but declined to ruff, declarer was able to draw trumps and the contract made. When Sathish finally arrived, we cleared up a couple of details of the bidding we hadn't managed to confirm by email, and kicked off the proceedings.

 I started off disappointingly guessing a key suit incorrectly in a normal 1NT contract, and failing to make an overtrick. According to the scorecard, this was worth 40% of the matchpoints, so I suspect that there were several more available if I'd gotten it right. We had a generally successful session (including beating 2♥XX by 3 tricks on one board...), but another couple of bad boards: one where I made a silly raise, and one where Sathish just forgot to ruff a loser before drawing trumps meant that our score was only good enough for second place. 

 Here's a board where we did well. I'll start off with the bidding problem:

What's your call with this hand? If you do open 1♥, what is rebid if partner bids 1NT (playing "standard" 2/1 without many agreements at all (I don't think we'd agreed to play Drury...). I decided to open 1♥, and  ended up playing the hand in 2♥. The lead is a small ♣, how do you play? 

I decided to try and get my ♠ ruff, as I couldn't really see a way to even 7 tricks without it, and so played a ♠ out of my hand immediately after ruffing the ♣. This was won on my left, and after quite a lot of thought, LHO finally played a ♥. I think any thought at all on this trick pretty much marks him with the ♥Q, as a ♥ to cut down the ruffs seems automatic without it, and I think the decision to finally play a ♥ anyway probably means he has Qxxx (however sound this reasoning is, it turned out to be correct...). I was now allowed to scramble home, making 5♥s 2♦s and a ruff (I won this trick in hand, ruffed a ♠, ruffed a ♣, ran the ♦Q which lost, and was relieved when E didn't have a ♣ for a trump promotion, and everyone followed to the third round of ♦s). Several tables had NS in much worse part score and at one table someone managed to beat 2♥ by two tricks, so this was a good score for us. I think 2♥-1 is probably the normal score, assuming EW don't manage to find the ♥ lead from Qxxx which cuts out the ♠ ruff. 

 An interesting evening, with a few differences form a British bridge club, and even more similarities. Shame I only managed to make it down once, but if I'm ever back in Chennai again, I'll be sure to pay a visit.

How high?

I played in the weekly club aggregate tournament on Wednesday. We didn't do very well, being on the wrong side of too many "normal" games that were not bid at the other tables. Ricky and Horst won our way, with Jim and Peter taking the East West first prize. 

I did have an interesting night though. On four separate occasions I had to decide how high to raise Norman's 1♠ bid, some of the decisions being more clear-cut than others. How high do you go? 

1.

2. 

3.

4. 

April's bridge

It's been an eventful few bridge weeks for me. First, there was an away match in Falkirk - where Adam and I had an auction where neither of us was sure if transfers were on, resulting in the opponents missing a good ♥ game, and drifting one off in 5♦. I definitely had unauthorised information on the auction, and the East District quite reasonably ruled that I'd taken advantage of this by not bidding on, and corrected the score to 6♣X. Luckily, this meant we still won the match by about 100 points. Also, it means we've now agreed which positions we play transfers after interference, at least after a 1♣ opener.

While all this was going on, there was a debate about Adam's eligibility for the National League. He hasn't been in Scotland long enough to qualify to play in the 2016 Camrose, but as we are entering in the Second Division, so aren't actually eligible to selected to play in the Camrose, we thought this would be ok. Eventually, the selection committee agreed, and we'll be entering next year. Mike McGinley and Laura Middleton are our team-mates.

Then there was the Melville Congress. Danny has an account of the pairs competition here. Martin and I didn't exactly cover ourselves in glory, but struggled to a lackluster 51% or something. It was Martin's first time playing transfers over 1♣, but I don't think we can use that as an excuse - I didn't play very well all, and we just let too many boards slip past. Then Adam and Martin's dad Peter joined us for the teams. I didn't actually feel that our performance in the teams was much better than in the pairs - I rather spectacularly let through 3♥X  by, essentially, forgetting to draw trumps turning what should have been +500 into -530, and causing us to lose a match we should have won comfortably. With a big win in the last match, we still somehow had done enough to win ourselves a silver prize (I think our team was technically bronze, but presumably we beat the next best silver team, and so qualified for the better prize).

Then there was the East District Men's teams - Paul has an account of it here. We came in in second place, and left in second place, but again we didn't really do a lot right - the only reason we managed to scrape second is that Paul, Miro, Mike and Arend were so far ahead of the rest of the field that barely anyone else managed to get above zero. There were a couple of hands where I pre-empted too far with hands that weren't quite offensive enough, and was soundly punished by the opponents.

Then this Friday, Jess was having dinner with the Edinburgh Mathematical Society, and as I had cancelled on Norman to go and play with Jun on Wednesday, we decided to head to St Andrew. When I got there, there was wine, cake and some delicious quiche-like things, as well as a raffle. I initially assumed that this was just how they like to do things on a Friday night at St Andrew, but it turns out we had picked the day of the club party. Once again we didn't have a great showing - scraping just over 50%. I had several interesting play hands, and seemed to be getting below average scores on all of them (although looking at the travellers now, most of them seem to have improved). I had an interesting bidding problem: 

What do you bid with the East cards? 4♣ seems obvious, as it keeps the auction alive and if partner does have a ♣ void, then there's a chance there's a grand. However, it also has the difficulty that whichever suit partner chooses, you've now wrongsided the contract in the more likely (?) event that he has exactly 2♣s - I'm not sure this is actually more likely, as you know partner has doubled in direct seat with what is presumably not a huge number of points, so he's more likely to be short in ♣s. I think 6♥ is probably correct. My actual choice (probably being greedy at match points) was a somewhat ambitious 6NT. This still had chances, when South led the ♣A, and his partner didn't give a suit preference signal... he had to guess between the majors, but unfortunately, he guessed right. I was one off for a surprising 27% of the matchpoints... one East who also guessed to play in 6NT got the unlucky ♠ lead and went 7 off! 6♥ or 6♦ making would have been 100%, so you win all the matchpoints if you came up with either 4♣ or 6♥, assuming you have the methods to find out that partner has a useful void. I'm not really sure how 80% of the tables stayed out of slam altogether.

John and Trish Matheson had a bidding mix up on another slam board, and still managed to get 94% against us. Trish transferred into ♣s, except she accidentally transferred into ♦s, and when her partner bid 3♦, she realised something had gone wrong, and just jumped to 6NT. With 14 tricks on top in any of three strains (ok, 7♦ is lucky), and with only a particularly bad trump break beating 7♠, you might think this was worth an average score at best - but everyone else managed to play in their club fit (one pair, who shall remain nameless, doing so at the three level...). So once again 6NT making 13 tricks was a huge score when 7 minor was cold. I don't know what it is - people don't appreciate the power of a long minor to take tricks in NT? Or they are just pleased to be bidding a making slam, and don't worry about the scoring?

It's the Buchanan Congress this week. Norman and I managed to finish third in the pairs - two places lower than last year, but we'll be aiming to do better in the teams next Saturday, particularly as our team-mates were one of the two pairs to beat us this weekend. Congratulations to Iain McIntyre and Bobby Moore, who get to take home the McLelland tankards (and I'll have to find somewhere else to keep my masterpoint certificates).

JJ Final

Yesterday was the final match of the season for Hillhead, we played the final of the Jackie Josephson against Gilmorehill. Unfortunately, they were just too good for us - we lost by about 4000 points over the 32 boards, even taking into account the fact that we started with a 2000 point headstart. I thought we did well to play in what seems to be a clearly better slam on this board, although our auction was not particularly impressive.

After Norman bid 2♦ over my strong 2♣ opening, I pretty much just drove to slam, as I didn't really have any way of finding out if he had the only card I was interested in - the ♠K. 

Norman drew trumps and played a ♣ towards the K. When Jim went in with the ♣A, the hand was over. John Murdoch seemed to think that this was wrongly played, but I can't actually figure out why. You don't have two entries to hand to pitch the black suit losers on the ♥QJ, and you still have the chance of the ♠J dropping when you play it this way. Maybe you should run a lot of ♦s first? But this line has at least an 80% chance of success. There was also a discussion afterwards of how good 6NT is (on a ♥ lead). Basically, you need to be able to play this ♠ suit for no losers. Danny Kane and Jim came to the conclusion that this was 62% after the match (this was Jim's instinct, and Danny did some calculations).  

Using Richard Pavlicek's bridge calculator (I don't have a Windows machine at the moment, so can't run SuitPlay): you can pick up: void in either hand (1.5%); stiff J in either hand (2.5%); Jx in either hand (16.2%); Jxx in either hand (35.6%) and a small singleton onside (6.1%). This is a total of 61.9%, so they did pretty well... 

In addition, no defender can keep all of ♠Jxxx ♥K ♣A if you come down to a 5 card ending, so if you're willing to back yourself, and if the player with the long spades has one of the high cards in the other two suits then you have some chances of an endplay. 


We also won a Gold Cup Plate match on Wednesday, so will get a rematch against John Dick's team, who knocked us out of the Gold Cup proper in our very first match. No bridge this weekend, but next weekend is the Melville one day congress, I'm playing with Martin Stephens in the pairs and Adam Dickinson, with Martin and his dad, in the teams. 

Things are getting closer to being sorted for our National League team, a couple of people have some decisions to make, and it's possible there will end up being just two of us looking for team-mates, but I've spoken to a few people lately who don't have teams sorted yet, and I'm confident I'll be playing again, if not quite sure who with yet.

Livingston Away

We played away at Livingston yesterday, in what I think was probably our last league match of the season, but there might be one more. We found out rather more than any of us wanted to about a knee operation that someone in the adjoining bowling club had recently been through (the room wasn't very soundproofed), and cruised to a comfortable victory. I played with Yvonne Wiseman, and we had the run of the cards, finishing +3400 at the end of the night, and only conceding two game contracts, I think. 

The most exciting hand was the one above. Yvonne made it very easy for me, by opening the West cards 2♣. There's pretty much no way that I'm stopping in any contract other than 7NT now, so I should probably just bid it straight away, but I thought I'd waste some time by bidding 2♦ on the way. I got the expected confirmation that that Yvonne's bid was based on a solid ♠ suit, and decided to stop messing around. LHO led a club, and I might a slightly lazy claim, just putting my hand on the table, and pointing out that I had 14 top tricks (had the opponents forced me to state a line of play, I would probably have been pitching the ♠A on the ♦A, just because I could...). 

Perhaps surprisingly, we were the only pair to reach this optimal contract. Our other EW had a Blackwood mix-up and stopped in 6 of something, the opponents also had one pair who bid 6 of something, and one pair who somehow managed to play in 7♥ (maybe the guy with the solid ♠ suit was worried his partner would correct to 8♥ if he bid 7♠?). 
I'm not sure how things would go if Yvonne made the (I think) more normal 1♠ opening on her huge hand. over 2♦, she will still rebid 3♠, and once again I know she has solid spades and something outside, but without being about to find out about the 4th ♥, or the 8th ♠ I think it might be difficult for me to count 13 tricks. I'm certainly never going to picture her actual hand!

Yvonne thought for a while before bidding 2♣, and I spent the time wondering if I had a slam try if she opened 2♠. I think I do, we keep our second-in-hand weak 2's pretty solid. Something like AJTxxx xx Kxx xx opposite makes 6♦ nearly cold, and that's pretty much a dead minimum - I remember reading somewhere that if a suitable minimum from partner would make the contract a laydown then you should just go ahead and bid it. I was also wondering whether the fact she'd taken a while to bid gave me any ethical problem (I think probably not, she could have been considering any of passing, bidding 1♠ or 3♠, so it's not clear which way the information points - although I guess she wouldn't think for a while then pass, as this almost always gives partner a problem). Actually, given the style we were playing, I think it's very unlikely Yvonne would ever think for a while before bidding 2♠. Thinking for a while before bidding 1♠ on this hand would have made things more difficult for me.

We also agreed in the car on the way back that we'll be entering a team in the National League. There's at least 4 of us, and possibly up to 6, we just need to figure out who actually wants to play, who's eligible, and who wants to play with whom. It'll be good to be back in it, and hopefully with a good chance of qualifying for the first division. As I also submitted a Scottish Cup entry last week, (I'm playing with Adam and we're teaming up with Danny and Anna), I feel like I'm well organised for next year. 

Last night of the Winter Pairs tonight. Norman and I are not quite out of contention, currently sitting in a fairly comfortable 3rd place, but we'll need a score something in excess of 67% to catch the to pairs who are out in the lead. It's close at the top between Liz and Grace, who started off the competition with a a massive 68.83, and Christine and Ian who have consistently scored in excess of 62% almost every session. 

Promotion!

This week was a big one for the Hillhead team, with both a semi-final in the Jackie Josephson (a handicap cup competition) and our final league match, which would decide promotion. We won both, and after a slightly tense evening waiting for the scores from other matches, we did enough, and will be back in the first division next season, which some in our team find intimidating, but I'm very much looking forward to it. I also played in the West Distict Congress on Saturday and Sunday with Norman and Adam. I'm not going to say much about that, apart from that Adam was remarkably understanding when I revoked to let through a doubled part-score when playing at table 1 of the Swiss Teams on the Sunday... a very useful feature in a partner! (not that I intend to make a habit of it...)

With the league season winding down, I'll be trying to figure out how to make sure I continue to get my bridge fix over the summer, and at some point this month I'll have to work out whether or not I'm playing in this year's National League.

Just one board from yesterday's league match. I played in 4♠ after the auction above, and the defence got off to a reasonable start with two ♦ tricks and a ♦ ruff. West now switched to a small ♣, and as I've pretty much got no chance if the finesse is wrong, I ran this to my ♣10. Now what? I think basically it's about guessing the ♠ suit. I got this wrong, playing a club to the 9, ruffing a ♣, and playing two rounds of ♠s from the top. I figured that W was less likely to have played for a ruff if he had the ♠Q. However, I did know that he had fewer ♦s that his partner, so maybe playing him for greater ♠ length than his partner was correct, but this was exactly balanced out by what I knew about the ♣ suit. In any case, no-one else managed to make the game, apart from the pair who got a helpful ♥ lead, and our 1500 point margin was enough for us to secure promotion to the First Division next season.

Men's Teams 2015

I played with David Wiseman in the Men's Teams on Sunday. Our card was nothing to be proud of, and our team-mates seemed mostly relieved by this, as they were, if anything, even worse than us. We were deservedly comfortably at the bottom of the table. Congratulations to Mike Ash, Alex Adamson, Finlay Marshall and Patrick Home who won the event (narrowly beating Derek Sanders, Stephen Peterkin, George Plant and Peter Moss). 

Here is the last hand we played of the evening.

Having passed as dealer, (he might have opened if we were playing Acol, but probably not, as the rebid is potentially awkward), David understandably got excited when I opened 1♥, and even more excited when I bid a conventional 3♥, showing a non-minimum opener with a shortage in ♣s. After checking all the keycards were there, we didn't really have any system available to find out what could be done with the third round of ♠s, so David just decided to go for it. 

John Murdoch led a small ♣, and everyone followed to everything when I ruffed out the other suits, N pitching a ♣ on the second round of ♥s, so I was down to this ending. The missing cards being ♠Q98632 and ♣KJ. 

What next? Do you play off the last round of trumps? (I didn't, and I think this was a mistake - if either defender started off with 4 ♠s, they'd be forced to pitch one now, which gives you a big clue as to where the Q is). If you don't (or if you do, and both defenders pitch ♣s), which way do you play the ♠s? 

I played ♠ towards the ♠K next, and John played the ♠9. Does this tell you anything? 

There were 29 IMPs on the line on this board, as they had failed to bid even the small slam at the other table. Those 29 IMPs were worth more than 13 VPs (we were playing 4 board matches, and this would have converted a 20-0 defeat into a victory)... what are the clues? Is it any better than a guess?