THE QBA BULLETINPublished by the Queensland Bridge Association July-September 2012 Volume 38 No3www.qldbridge.com Email:manager@qldbridge.com

ContentsFrom the President ................................................................................ 1Barrier Reef Congress by Richard Touton ....................................... 1 by Richard Wallis ......................................... 4Cuppaidge's Column by George Cuppaidge.................................... 6Manager's Travels by Kim Ellaway ....................................................... 9ANC by Jim Evans...............................................................................10 by Nathan van Jole ...................................................................13Butler Pairs by Carolyn Woolley ......................................................15Teaching Tour by Joan Butts ...............................................................16Sunshine Coast Congress by Therese Tully ....................................17Graded Teams by Kamal Sangumarasa ............................................20 by Alan Boyce ............................................................21Graded Pairs by Richard Ward .........................................................22Yeppoon by Kim Ellaway ....................................................................23Club News ........................................................................................27Directors' Corner by Jan Peach .......................................................28

From the President

Keith McDonald

Richard Touton

Open Pairs

I HAD never played in a Barrier Reef Congress, but this year my favourite

partner, Ryan, agreed to play with me, and my wife, who had never been to Cairns, was keen to come along, so I took the plunge. Ryan also brought his girlfriend, and we spent a week in Cairns, doing tourist stuff for a couple of days on either side of the congress.Ryan and I entered the congress a bit underdone, having played together only once in the preceding six months, and our 28th seeding in a field of 76 didn’t cause any reason for optimism. Still it was pleasing to find out that Butler scoring, not matchpoints, was being used, as that better suits our style of play.Our first match was against a local pair, and we prevailed with 19-11

Barrier Reef Congress

THERE is a C lub D i rec to r Workshop scheduled for Saturday

29 September at QCBC. The session will be conducted by Jan Peach (QBA Director Accreditation). Enquires can be made to janpeach8@bigpond.com.The Australian Bridge Directors Association is hosting a weekend seminar in Melbourne on October13/14. It is very pleasing to see the activity in this most important area of our game.

Directing and teaching are essential to assist clubs expand their membership. Deta i ls o f b r idge lessons in Queensland are on the QBA website. If you have a friend interested in learning to play bridge please contact the person at the club you wish to attend.Congratulations to Margaret Millar and Carolyn Woolley, Queensland Women's Pairs champions for 2012, and Peter Hainsworth and Ralph Parker are the Men's title winners. Both titles were won at the Butler Open Pairs Championship.Also congratulations to the Qld Teams title holders Sanmugaras Kamalarasa, Peter Hainsworth, Nathan van Jole and Neville Francis.Entry forms for the 2013 Gold Coast Congress will be available in October. Our website has all the changes. Please enter as soon as possible. ■

2013 Gold Coast Congress

Feb 23 - Mar 2

Open Pairs winners: Ryan Touton and Richard Touton

T h e Q B A B u l l e t i n J u l y - S e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2

the 8 hands, and gave us a couple of gifts. We also generated an 11 IMP pickup on this hand, where I held the East cards.

Ryan’s aggressive 1H response and my subsequent aggressive splinter bid kept the opponents from finding a profitable 4S sacrifice (down 1). This shows again the wisdom of bidding 6-4 hands aggressively.These two wins propelled us to 2nd position, playing at Table 1 against the leaders, Therese Tully and Larry Norden. This time our opponents declared 7 out of 8 hands in a close match. Our entire winning margin of 12 IMPs (19-11 VP), was attributable to a single hand, where the opponents bid to a slightly optimistic vulnerable 6D contract on Board 18.

*GerberI didn’t have any difficulty finding the ♣K opening lead, and the contract was doomed to go one down. But note that if South had been declarer in 6D or 6NT, Ryan would find it considerably more difficult to find the killing club lead (against 6D I would probably lead a heart). Had that occurred we would have lost the match 11-19 VPs, instead of winning. A big slice of luck going our way (and not the last!).When we returned on Saturday morn-ing we found ourselves in the No 1 spot at Table 1 NS, a position we were able to maintain over the final 4 matches. In the first match of the day we played the 26th seeded pair and won 25-3 to con-solidate our position. The next match was against the top seeds, Nathan van Jole and David Beauchamp. This was a dour affair with no big swings or notable hands, finishing in a draw with 12 IMPs each. The second last match was also a hard-fought, low scoring encounter against Suzie Moses and Margaret Walters, from which we emerged with a small win.Thus we entered the final match, playing against Paul Hooykaas and Pele Rankin, with a lead of 10 VPs; enough to ensure we would win the event if we didn’t lose our last match. The first board was a fairly routine part score of 3S. This could have been defeated with the ♥K lead from

♠ Q10 ♥ K10 ♦ Q109876 ♣ A53

but Ryan made the sensible lead of ♦10, which gave a trick. Then disaster seemingly struck on the next hand.

Dlr E ♠ AJ9 Vul NS ♥ K10 ♦ K109865

♣ 92 ♠ 1082 ♠ 654 ♥ Q752 ♥ J863 ♦ A42 ♦ J ♣ 1086 ♣ KQ743 ♠ KQ73 ♥ A94 ♦ Q73 ♣ AJ5

NW E S

W N E S P 1NT P 4C* P 4S P 6D All pass

Dlr W ♠ KJ108 Vul EW ♥ 7 ♦ K10852

♣ AQ2 ♠ 7 ♠ A962 ♥ 1098654 ♥ AKJ2 ♦ Q764 ♦ 9 ♣ J8 ♣ K1094 ♠ Q543 ♥ Q3 ♦ AJ3 ♣ 7653

NW E S

W N E S P P(! Ed) 1C P 1H! X 4D P 4H All pass

Dlr E ♠ KQ106 Vul NS ♥ KJ10987 ♦ A8

♣ 3 ♠ AJ52 ♠ 983 ♥ 2 ♥ Q654 ♦ 10543 ♦ Q9 ♣ Q1087 ♣ AK62 ♠ 74 ♥ A3 ♦ KJ762 ♣ J954

NW E S

W N E S P P P 1H P 1NT* P 3H P 4H All pass

VPs, despite losing 9 IMPs when Ryan failed to make a cold game. However we had a 10 IMP pickup on Board 2.

* ForcingThis made for the loss of a spade, a heart and a club. This game was not bid at most tables, the key being the ostensibly light jump rebid of 3H, which we play as a decent 15+ and a 6+ card suit. On this occasion the hand’s 6-4 shape and great intermediates made it feel like it was worth 15+. I later put it through the Kaplan and Rubens Hand Evaluator, which rated it as worth 17.25 points.The second match, which we won 25-4, was also against a North Queensland pair. They declared 6 of

The directors and caddies: Danielle Leahy, Adam Burcher, Frank Burcher, Sean Mullamphy, Peter Busch and Janet Burcher.

2

T h e Q B A B u l l e t i n J u l y - S e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2

In retrospect, it would have been better for me to make a negative double instead of the 3C cue raise. That leaves more room to investigate 3NT. On this hand, 3NT can make double dummy if declarer is clairvoyant and does not start diamonds by leading the queen or jack. 5D is probably a superior contract, as declarer also has that play available in trumps, and has additional chances to play the heart suit for no loss. (In fact it makes 6D double dummy.)Ryan won the ♣K opening lead, and naturally enough crossed to the ♥K and led the ♦Q. This was correct play, but cost a trick this time. He guessed the spade suit correctly, and ran some trumps, on one of which East discarded a small heart. Now he had a choice of playing to the top heart to drop the queen with West or the ♥J to smother a doubleton ten. Unfortunately he tried the latter and we went down, which at the time I

Dlr E ♠ Q108 Vul Both ♥ J982 ♦ A9762

♣ A ♠ K976 ♠ J53 ♥ Q3 ♥ 10764 ♦ K ♦ 1085 ♣ KQJ974 ♣ 632 ♠ A42 ♥ AK5 ♦ QJ43 ♣ 1085

NW E S

W N E S P 1D 2C 3C P 3D P 5D All pass

Joint Restricted winners: Tony and Anne Ghusn

estimated to be a result of –7 or –8 IMPs (it turned out to be –3).Feeling that the match was slipping from our grasp, I hoped for a hand or two where we could claw some IMPs back. Unfortunately, no such opportunities arose, and we wound up suffering our only loss by 8 IMPs (13-17 VPs). I knew we were vulnerable to be overtaken, and it took an excruciating age before the final results were posted. In the end, relief … we held on to win by 4VPs.Even if we hadn’t exceeded our expectations in the Pairs, the Barrier Reef Congress would have been an enjoyable and memorable experience. The congress was efficiently run, the participants were pleasant and friendly, the venue was great and the weather was fantastic. My congratulations to the organisers. ■

The Teams

THE 2012 BRC was held in Cairns from June 8 to June 11, and the

Teams started on Saturday afternoon following completion of the Eric Parsons' Pairs in the morning. The 48 teams contesting the Open Teams

this year was slightly up on 2011, but the entry for the Restricted Teams was slightly down.The standard in the Open was very high, in spite of competition from the VCC held in Melbourne at the same time, and while the eventual winners, (Nathan van Jole, Andy Braithwaite, David Beachamp and Phil Gue) skipped away to a good lead with 1 match to play, there were quite a few teams vying for the minor placings in the final match, and even VAN JOLE could have been relegated to 4th with a very bad loss.In a promoter's dream, the final match-ups had team 1 (6th) v 3 (5th), team 2 (1st) v 4 (2nd) and team 28 (3rd) v team 19 (4th). The VAN JOLE team (#2) lost their only match 12-18, but still averaged just over 20 VPs per match to win by 4 VPs from team (#28) (Fred Whittaker, Neil Stuckey, Barry Jones and Jenny Middleton) who won their last match 25-3 to average just under 20 VPs per match. Team 4 (Richard Ward, Lindy Vincent, Therese Tully, Pele Rankin and Paul Hooykaas) won their last match against the leaders 18-12, but with their rivals getting bigger wins, had to be content with equal 3rd with my team 3 (Richard Wallis, John Brockwell, Annette Maluish and Neville Francis).As usual, a very enjoyable event, and I look forward to Mackay in 2013, still in June due to venue problems, but with the State Government talking about

Winners of the Teams: Phil Gue, David Beauchamp, Nathan van Jole and Andy Braithwaite

Richard Wallis

T h e Q B A B u l l e t i n J u l y - S e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2

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When the ♠J dropped in the West hand, that looked like 1 IMP away, but at the other table after a similar start Annette and Neville stole the hand in 3D, which made exactly for +110, and 11 IMPs after all.

Board 22 in the second match was a case of not watching the bidding properly (we are Seniors after all), and East took full advantage of the mix-up and bad break with a double.John and I had agreed that a cue-bid after partner opens or overcalls shows at least a limit raise in partner’s suit, and that is what John thought he was doing by bidding 2C!Since West opened 1D, I read 2C as natural, and raised with what I thought was good support, in spite of John having previously passed.

overcall I led the ♦3, and declarer made 10 tricks for –170. At the other table, after a different auction, Neville and Annette also stopped in 3S, but made 11 tricks for 1 IMP.

On board 8 in the first match, West’s 2H opening bid showed that suit and a minor, with 5-5 and less than an opening hand, and East’s double asked for the minor suit.I would like to have shown both of my suits, but since West could have clubs, I bid what was in front of me and John raised to game.East led the ♥Q, covered on the table, and West cashed the top hearts and led a 3rd heart.Since any spade length is certain to be with East, I did not ruff, instead discarding a club, and since the ♥9 in dummy was high, East was forced to ruff and I then had no trouble taking the rest of the tricks for +420.

reverting to the Queen’s Birthday holiday in June, we do not know when we will be playing in 2014. If it could be moved away from the VRC, it could only get bigger.

Board 2 in the first match was a dangerous auction for EW, and I believe that West was lucky after bidding 3S with a void in partner’s long suit and no guarantee of spade support, but getting the dummy shown.East did not feel inclined to raise to game, in spite of a singleton, 3-card spade support and a fair suit of his own, so maybe the West hand falls in with their criteria for bidding a new suit in such an auction.South can lead a trump and hold East to 10 tricks in 4S, or possibly just 9 if declarer does not guess the clubs, but played by West, 4S is cold.Obviously in response to John’s

M 2 ♠ AQ542 Bd 22 ♥ 3 Dlr W ♦ J984

Vul NS ♣ AQ2 ♠ 6 ♠ KJ108 ♥ 1087 ♥ 9652 ♦ AK1062 ♦ Q7 ♣ KJ53 ♣ 1084 ♠ 973 ♥ AKQJ4 ♦ 53 ♣ 976

NW E S

W N E S P P 1D 1S X 2C! 2D 3C P 3S P 4S X All pass

M 1 ♠ A7432 Bd 8 ♥ 43 Dlr W ♦ 6

Vul None ♣ AK762 ♠ J ♠ 865 ♥ AJ875 ♥ Q10 ♦ QJ874 ♦ K1053 ♣ 94 ♣ QJ83 ♠ KQ109 ♥ K962 ♦ A92 ♣ 105

NW E S

W N E S 2H 2S X! 4S All pass

M 1 ♠ Q2 Bd 2 ♥ 108542 Dlr E ♦ 10853

Vul NS ♣ KQ ♠ AK8763 ♠ J54 ♥ — ♥ KQJ963 ♦ 972 ♦ J ♣ AJ108 ♣ 765 ♠ 109 ♥ A7 ♦ AKQ64 ♣ 9432

NW E S

W N E S 2H 3D 3S All pass

Larry Norden, owner of Cosmetics Plus - a major sponsor of the event

Second in the Teams: Barry Jones, Jenny Millington, Neil Stuckey and Fred Whitaker

T h e Q B A B u l l e t i n J u l y - S e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2

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18th Barrier Reef Congress

June 7, 8, 9 & 10, 2013

Venue - North Mackay Bowls Club, Mackay, Q 4740Chief Director – Laurie KelsoTournament Organiser – Janet Hansen 07 4954 6844President – Barbara Tait 07 4955 1200Website: www.qldbridge.com/brc

John, realising his mistake, corrected to 3S, but I went on to game based on my good fit for clubs.East told me something was wrong when he doubled the final contract, and after the lead of the ♦Q, John was able to fill me in on his 2C bid.I could not avoid the 5 obvious losers, and finished 2 down for –300, which was 9 IMPs away compared to 2S just making at the other table.

On board 25 in the second match neither John nor I knew what West was up to, and neither of us risked a double of the final contract. After all, EW were vulnerable, so it was difficult to envisage West with so many losers.When dummy went down I was amazed at the East hand for the 3C opening at adverse vulnerability, and also very disappointed at the 3 cards in hearts and the doubleton spade.Looking at all of the hands, 5H should be 2 off via the top cards in clubs and spades and the trump promotion via the 3rd club, which is 5 IMPs away as it was obvious that 5D was cold.The damage was lessened when declarer failed to lead any trumps before attempting to ruff a spade in dummy, and John made a trick with his ♥J before executing the trump promotion for +300.At the other table Neville knew that 5H would be too expensive, so the auction subsided in 5D, making 11 tricks for +400, but 3 IMPs away. ■The full article can be found on the website - www.qldbridge.com

W N E S P 3C 3D 4H 5D P P 5H All pass

M 2 ♠ J1097 Bd 25 ♥ 1093 Dlr N ♦ KQJ93

Vul EW ♣ 4 ♠ KQ432 ♠ 86 ♥ AKQ874 ♥ 652 ♦ — ♦ 52 ♣ 85 ♣ QJ10963 ♠ A5 ♥ J ♦ A108764 ♣ AK72

NW E S

Best zonal team: Hugh McAlister, Diana McAlister, Bruce Bowden and Elsie Stubbs

Restricted Teams winners: Phillip Ellis, Lesley Fraser, Jody Swaine and Rebecca Delaney

T h e Q B A B u l l e t i n J u l y - S e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2

5

Dlr N ♠ AJ965 ♥ AJ4 ♦ J7

♣ J32 ♠ 32 ♠ 108 ♥ 982 ♥ 1073 ♦ K10832 ♦ 964 ♣ A95 ♣ Q10874 ♠ KQ74 ♥ KQ65 ♦ AQ5 ♣ K6

NW E S

Cuppaidge’s Column

George Cuppaidge

JORJ STANDARD 2012, is a system which encapsulates all the bidding concepts which are regularly aired in my column. The system notes are now published on the QBA Articles page of the QBA website. The notes are detailed and are all you need to play the system.The system is extremely easy to play, it is so natural. It is also easy to learn because everything in it follows logically on from its two fundamental precepts, “Do not invite game” and “2NT always forcing.”In this basic form it is at least the equal to any standard system in existence. Without any changes whatsoever, relay continuations can be incorporated, to create a system which will outbid everyone, in the slam zone. Relays introduced at

How would you bid and play this one?

This was the actual bidding. North opened 1S and South invoked Blackwood. Over 5H he signed off in 6NT. Do you like this bidding? I certainly do not. If North has his most probable holding, a minimum balanced hand you will be playing 6NT with no particularly long suit and a combined point count unlikely to exceed 32 points. That is simply not enough. South should not sell out on the possibility that North holds a 4-card heart suit. There are a lot of bids available to investigate anything from playing in game only to a grand slam. The one thing in favour of an immediate Blackwood is that it agrees spades.E v e n w i t h o u t c o n v e n t i o n a l agreements, South should begin with 2C. A raise will not be a problem as South can always revert to spades. Should North rebid his spades, as long as that promises six or more, South should bid 6S, if hearts then 6H. If North’s rebid is 2NT, and that is a minimum rebid, 3NT is plenty. The deal highlights the need for a conventional treatment, (and good understandings).The 2C response to one of a major, is commonly played that way these days.

My recommendation is, bid 2C on game-going hands without five cards in any suit except possibly clubs, or the 10-12 three-card raise, opener rebids as follows.• 2D all 10-14 points. All other replies 15-19 points game forcing• Suit rebid six cards or more, no four-card side suit.• Two of the other major, four-card suit.• 2NT 15-19 points, 5-3-3-2. He can narrow the range after a 3C ask from responder. He can show his doubleton too if you are really serious.• 3C/D natural, 4+ cards.Over 2D, to return to opener’s suit shows the 10-12 point three-card raise. The other major asks opener to describe in exactly the same way, now limited to 10-14 points. Responder can continue naturally, promising long clubs or seek more information about opener’s hand via the other major; relay. This is a very neat set of bids, it solves a lot of fundamental problems which are common to all standard systems. It can be used over 1D too, as long as 1D is not better minor. Responder’s relay over opener’s 2D rebid is 2H. In all cases, responder’s 2NT over opener’s 2D, is a “replacement bid.” It shows four-cards in the relay suit and five or more cards in clubs. Perhaps most importantly of all, this treatment removes the perceived need to open 1NT holding a five-card major.In the above hand, opener’s first rebid is 2D, and over 2H, further ask, it is 2NT showing 10-14 points, balanced. 3D over 3C now shows 10-12 points. South can confidently sign off in 4S or 3NT. (The next three steps show 13-14 points, with low, middle and high doubleton.)Against the actual 6NT declarer was favoured with a diamond lead. Aggressive leads are usually best against small slams, even NT slams. It doesn’t look right here and it wasn’t. Without the diamond lead declarer has no chance at all. When dummy’s ♦J held, West was marked with the ♦K.At this stage the contract can be made if declarer can guess who holds the ♣A. If East, declarer simply leads a club to his ♣K for his twelfth trick. This line has the virtue of simplicity. If

West, he must read the end position and either throw West in with it or drop his bared ♦K. Against a good opponent sitting West, you may misread the end position even if he does hold it. But no declarer worth his salt would commit himself too early. In fact he can come quite safely down to this position, with dummy to lead. ♠ 5 ♥ — ♦ 7 ♣ J3 ♠ — ♠ — ♥ — ♥ — ♦ K10 ♦ 6 ♣ A9 ♣ Q108 ♠ — ♥ — ♦ AQ ♣ K6If you stick with Plan A, you discard a diamond on your last spade and lead a club towards your ♣K. If you conclude that East, who has only discarded two clubs, has the ♣Q not the ♣A, you discard a club. West is squeezed and you can make your contract. A crafty defender may have bared his ♦K early, but a third diamond discard will look very suspicious. His willingness to discard clubs is another factor.The clues slightly favour the more satisfying line, so surely that is the one to follow. Alas, the play showed a similar degree of imagination as did the bidding. ■

T h e Q B A B u l l e t i n J u l y - S e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2

6

T h e Q B A B u l l e t i n J u l y - S e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2

7

Psychological PlaysThese plays tend to be under-written-up. It is good to be aware of them when no real chance is available. Leading towards nothing in the closed hand can be very effective.

West led a small diamond to East’s ♦K, ducked by declarer. Declarer wanted East on lead. West continued diamonds perforce won by declarer.Declarer’s chances at this point looked to be somewhere between remote and zero. Definitely a time for a psychological play.The ♣K was cashed, East’s ♣10 noted, and a club to dummy’s ♣Q. Now a low spade was led off the board and West fell for it, rising with the ♠K, although few declarers would have been misled had he played the ♠A instead. At this point he had end-played himself, but not hopelessly. A high spade play and a spade exit is safe, declarer must still lose a heart trick. A heart is fatal as was his actual choice, a third round of diamonds. Declarer ruffed in hand, threw a heart from dummy and began a cross-ruff by playing ace, king and ruffing a heart. The ♠Q was led from dummy, obliging East who could not play a killing third trump, to win. Declarer had the rest. ■

More adventures with RKCBWhat convention leads to more disasters than any other? In my experience RKCB wins by a distance, and they are always very expensive. Here is just another one.

My partner opened 1D. This seemed the near perfect hand for the convention. If I asked immediately, diamonds would be the agreed suit and that vital ♦K in partner's hand would have ace status. If partner showed just one key card 5S should be reasonable, if two, then 6S. If all three we can count twelve tricks, surely the thirteenth will be either there or establishable. Partner’s 5C showed 0 or 3. Could he possibly have zero? This was one time that, I thought, it was nice to be facing a sound opening bidder. He could hold just 12 points, with this hand.

He must hold exactly, all those honours, a miniscule probability.Of course I could have relied upon him to convert with three, when you know where you want to play, bid it just in case, so I went with the odds and bid 7S. I commented at the time that I hope you have three partner, East remarked that he held two aces and doubled.This was dummy.

Clearly my man had concluded that no suit was agreed and that I simply wanted to know bulk aces. One of the fundamental rules of RKCB states that a jump to 4NT over an opening bid in a suit agrees that suit. To invoke Blackwood, any form of Blackwood, there must be an agreed suit. Otherwise there is nowhere to sign off. There is one time when Gerber is a useful convention, when 4NT might be construed as quantitative, over an opening bid or

Dlr S ♠ Q874 Vul EW ♥ J73 ♦ 53

♣ AQ62 ♠ J1032 ♠ AK9 ♥ 94 ♥ Q1062 ♦ Q974 ♦ KJ1086 ♣ 743 ♣ 10 ♠ 65 ♥ AK85 ♦ A2 ♣ KJ985

NW E S

W N E S 1C P 1S X P 2D P P X P 3C 3D 4C All pass

♠ KQJ10432 ♥ K6 ♦ A7 ♣ A6

♠ 96 ♥ QJ7 ♦ QJ832 ♣ KQJ

these levels are unlikely to offend against system regulations anywhere, and certainly not in Australia.If you do take up the system and need help, contact me on jorj41@gmail.com. ■

Beginner HandThis really is a beginner (intermediate in my view, Ed.) hand, but since my BBO expert messed it up, there might be one reader out there who would too. I hope you are not that one.

♠ 96 ♥ Q74 ♦ KQ832 ♣ KQ

rebid in NT. But if you do decide to play it, play it simple, 01234. RKCG is actually played, spare me please. My personal preference, over 1NT or 2NT, is for 4C/D as Texas and 4H/S to play. Responder should be able to decide which side the hand is better played from, particularly at mixed pairs. For casual partnerships, 4C Gerber has the great virtue of simplicity.In this particular hand, had my bid been understood, partner bids 5D, I know he cannot hold four key cards, and so I sign off in 5S. Could that be a king-ask, with 5H asking for the DQ? Maybe so. RKCB is certainly not a convention for sissies.Jorj replies go part of the way to solving the problem. At least you can be sure immediately how many key cards partner holds. They are• 5C 0 or 4 key cards• 5D 1 key card• 5H 2 key cards without the

queen of the agreed suit.• 5S 3 key cards• 5NT 2 key cards and the key

queen.Even these replies do not resolve the question posed above. Is a new suit, higher ranking than the notionally agreed suit, for play, a key queen –ask or for kings? Perhaps a reader has an answer to this one? The problem with bidding your own suit first, then using Blackwood, is that the king of partner’s suit is no longer a key card. ■

Sunshine Coast

Contract Bridge Club

Novice PairsNovember 11

Closing date: November 7

T h e Q B A B u l l e t i n J u l y - S e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2

8

♠ AK76 ♠ QJ54 ♥ A1065 ♥ QJ932 ♦ J76 ♦ 83 ♣ 32 ♣ A10

The bidding: West opened 1C and over East’s 1H, raised to 2H. North intervened with 3D and East bid 4H, (3H sounds competitive) - all pass.South led the ♦9, to North’s ♦Q, and followed with the ♦2, to North’s ♦A. How do you play to the ♦K?North, to my taste, has committed one of the two great crimes of bridge. He has passed first and come in later. (The other is passing with a 12 count.) Not only did it push EW into a game which could easily be missed, it ensured that any half-competent declarer would make it.Appreciating that the ♥K must be on his left to get home, declarer simply discards the ♣10 on the third round of diamonds. This is a “no-lose” play as the club must be lost. No continuation can do any harm and South’s ♥K42 will be picked up at the first opportunity. When this East ruffed with the ♥Q, South made his ♥K and the defenders got their club trick later on. ■

IT not only turned cold in June, July and August but Ray (husband

for those who don’t know) retired from the Public Service after 35 years with the help of a redundancy package. It has made my life easier as I have offloaded some of the work, freeing me up for some more bridge weekends and weekday bridge. However, we will not be increasing our flying to congresses. In early June we travelled to the North and yes, we travelled by plane and yes, I travelled badly again. I think our bridge must have suffered because the weekend is a bit of a blur - that might have been all the catching up dinners we had as starting my bridge career in the North I have a lot of

friends and they all remember me as the 12-year-old bridge player and they all have a lot of fun telling stories to my teammates and hubbie.We played a couple of teams events at the Sunshine Coast and Moreton-Bribie clubs and came fourth in both, and were pleasantly surprised to receive prize money at the Bribie event.We played at Lockyer in the pairs and this year it was packed with players (nearly a full house) - maybe it had something to do with the wonderful homemade soup they serve up for lunch or perhaps it’s the general warmth the members from Lockyer give.We then had a spate of team members with bad luck stories so as not to play with Mum and me. At the Graded Teams we gave one of our usual teammates a leave pass as the Barossa Valley was more inviting but her brother Richard Ward had an urgent appendectomy on the day of the event hence he could not play, so we played with Paul Hooykaas and Janeen Solomon and came fifth. Then we (Ray and I) were planning to play with long standing teammates Toni Bardon and Tony Treloar at the Graded Teams at BBC when Toni rang from Darwin to say her plane had been delayed for 24 hours and she would not be home in time. Fortunately for us Cheryl Stone was happy to fill in at the last minute.In July we played in the teams at Surfers with Gerald and Bev our usual Barrier Reef teammates but in the pairs I played with Bev and Ray played with Hari Baumanis. However, this was during the Olympics and the

pairs was on the same day as the Opening Ceremony which of course I watched prior to leaving for the coast. I love watching sport particularly the Olympics and hence I had very little sleep over this period. Back to the Moreton-Bribie event. On Board 24 of the last round of the second session, we were running equal second and found ourselves playing against the CHAKRADEO team. We felt we had a strong match at our table and the results from the other table were as strong but the last board was a result of –920, +430 giving us –10 IMPs on the board and it seemed our fault. 6C was cold as was 6H but we did not have the ability to get there. I asked Nik Moore and Malcolm Carter to write up the hand because this board not only secured the win for the day it dropped us to fourth as Malcolm and Nik were the only ones to bid it. It is great bidding (see the last hand in Malcolm's article) and I am happy to lose (not really) under these conditions. August saw us playing at Sunnybank in their teams event and Lady Luck was with us most of the day and when the music stopped we came third. I was playing with Cheryl Stone in this event with teammates Toni Bardon and Ray.September is a big month for us, Ray and I travel by car to Yeppoon to their inaugural Congress and my daughter Alex, who most of you know, turns 21. We travel to New Zealand with Therese Tully and Toni Bardon to play in the New Zealand Nationals and I will report on this in the next issue. As I finish this article I am swotting up on how to fly the plane to Auckland. ■

Manager's Travels

Sessions: Mon 10.30 am 7.30 pm Tue 10.00 am 7.30 pm Wed 10.30 am 7.30 pm Thur 10.30 am Fri 10.00 am 7.30 pm Sat 1.00 pmSupervised: Mon 7.30 pm Fri 9.30 am

67 Ipswich Rd WoolloongabbaPh: 3391 3241 Email: qcbc1@optusnet.com.au

www.qcbc.org.au

QCBC

Kim Ellaway

T h e Q B A B u l l e t i n J u l y - S e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2

9

IT was both an honour and a privilege to be asked to captain the Open and

Senior teams.The venue was the Darwin Convention Centre. Very similar in appearance to the Gold Coast Convention centre, the setting was idyllic and very relaxing, looking out over the harbour. It was a balmy 30 degrees in the daytime and a cool 18 or so at night.The weather was perfect. Being peak season the place was full to overcrowded, but this did not prevent many Queenslanders from making the pilgrimage. Darwin in winter is very cosmopolitan, when walking down the street only every second or third person had an Australian accent, the others were from all over the world. Now to the bridge.There was always harmony and good team spirit despite the results of some matches.No acrimony was levelled at anyone regardless of results. When someone made an error, it was always admitted with a, “Sorry, that was my fault.” Everyone was punctual in arriving to play and all were there to score-up together after the round. The teams both worked to help make my job as Captain much easier. It was a pleasure to be Captain of such good teams. The hardest part was not being able to play bridge myself for almost a week.The teams were positive on all occasions and we had our chances.

The Open TeamWe were always threatening and never far away from a chance to make the final. The 3rd last round saw us in fourth place and only 25 imps away from making the final. However after some bad luck and unforced errors we fell away. Our fourth placing after the final round was respectable and reasonable.

Before playing the 3rd last round, we had a small hiccup in the team.It was Kamal and Peter Hainsworth’s turn to play in the third session but Kamal was not well in the morning. He was feeling better by lunchtime, so Mike and Betty returned to their unit near the Convention centre. With 15 minutes to go before the start of the 3rd session Kamal’s illness returned and he said it would be better if he did not play. I tried phoning Betty but there was no answer, so I now had to hurry over to the unit complex and try to find Mike and Betty. Neville and Kevin had to stay and play. After a brief search I found Mike and Betty’s unit and the girl at the reception let me phone them, but Mike said Betty had gone for a swim in the lagoon. So now I had to hurry down there and find Betty. After a few minutes looking at all the girls (in the line of duty, of course!) I finally found Betty just drying herself off after her swim. I said, “Betty, you have to come and play”. So now Betty had to hurry back to the unit to get changed, Mike was waiting in the lobby. Five minutes later they hurried into the Convention centre. It was the only time I had even seen Betty looking somewhat dishevelled. As a real trouper, she had put the team ahead of personal appearance!I would like to thank the NSW team for their good sportsmanship as the rules say we could only replace the sick

player, however in the spirit of the game they allowed Betty and Mike to play. Here are some of the hands played with commentary by declarer or defender.This hand was Betty and Mike against NSW with Pauline Gumby (N) and Warren Lazer (S).I was the “Creature From the Lagoon” having been pulled away from a lovely swim in the Darwin salt water lagoon by our captain Jim to play again, when one of our teammates became ill. I have never before had to get dressed so quickly to play bridge and never before played with wringing wet hair!

* Multi-2

Jim Evans

ANC

R 12 ♠ 4 Bd 12 ♥ KQJ9 Dlr W ♦ AQ1094

Vul NS ♣ K74 ♠ QJ10753 ♠ 862 ♥ 10865 ♥ A32 ♦ K ♦ J752 ♣ 52 ♣ Q98 ♠ AK9 ♥ 74 ♦ 863 ♣ AJ1063

NW E S

W N E S 2D* X P P 2S X P 3S P 4H P 6NT All pass

The Open team: Jim Evans (npc), Mike Robson, Neville Francis, Betty Lee, Kevin Steffensen, Kamal Sangumarasa and Peter Hainsworth.

T h e Q B A B u l l e t i n J u l y - S e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2

10

As Mike tabled the ♠Q, Warren volunteered that Pauline’s 2nd double showed 19+ points. As she put dummy down, Pauline said, “I wish I did have a hand like that!” Unwisely, my confidence of beating this contract began to rise.Warren won the opening lead with the ♠K. After much deliberation, he crossed to the ♣K and finessed my ♣Q. Then he led a heart to the king. This is where optimism got the better of judgement and, after a short consideration, I took the ace and returned a spade to South’s ♠A. In so doing I set the stage for a squeeze. If only I had held up. Then Warren has to decide between hearts breaking or finessing against the ♥10.As it was Mike was squeezed in spades and hearts. This 27-point 6NT required 2 finesses (♣J and ♦Q) and a squeeze. If I hold up the ♥A, the contract will require 3 finesses. Would Warren have found the finesse of the ♥9? I regret not putting him to the test.In his defence Warren was very apologetic about have bid this slam, but not sorry about having made it.This was a missed opportunity against the eventual winners; SA.

As West I ended up in 4H via a transfer whilst SA overbid to 5H. North led a diamond and I went up with the ace and immediately took the losing spade finesse which proved fatal. Of course I should have taken the ruffing finesse (ace followed by the queen) tossing a diamond if North did not cover or if South held the king (loser on loser) using the ♠J to dispose of my losing club.On this board (next column), also against SA, I intervened over North’s 1D with a bid of 2C and got doubled

for my trouble. South took the first 2 diamond tricks and switched to the ♠J which North won with the ace and continued the suit so I won in dummy and led a club. North ducked and my king took the trick. I eventually went one down for a loss of 100 against a score of 630 for our other half.From Neville and KevinOn this hand against NSW, playing Gumby-Lazer, we were NS.

The lead was the ♦Q won in hand by Neville with the king who played a small club to the king. Next was the ♠A and, because this is teams and to cater for 4 spades with West, Neville led a small spade towards his hand. East played the 7 and Neville played the 9. West won his queen and continued with the ♦Jack to the ace. A small club was ruffed with the ♠K and now back to the ♠J to draw the last spade, making 12 tricks.Now from Kamal and PeterSeveral people including friends

and neutrals rated the Queensland Open Team to finish at the bottom of the pack. But despite Peter and I performing well below our best, we finished fourth behind South Australia, Victoria and New South Wales - thanks to our teammates Betty, Mike, Neville and Kevin. Here is one where I thought I got lucky.

* 4 hearts and a good handWhen the 1S opening was passed around to me (West) I bid 2H. North rebid 2S and my partner bid two 2NT, showing a good hand with four hearts. Despite the singleton spade I decided not to bid game as my club suit lacked spot cards. When North bid 3S my partner passed, but there was a break in tempo. I now changed my mind and bid 4H. Opponents reserved their rights but proceeded with defence. North led the ♠A and continued spades, won in dummy with the king on which I discarded a club. My only hope here was to find North with ace doubleton club and South with the ♦J. So I played a trump to hand and played a diamond to the king. Now I cashed two more rounds of hearts ending up in hand and played a club towards dummy. When the ace appeared, ten tricks rolled in. I thought that was a singleton at that time. Opponents called the Director, who ruled that we (EW) should record our score as +100 and not +420. NS were directed to record –420 in their score card. This was an interesting

R 5 ♠ K93 Bd 4 ♥ 954 Dlr W ♦ 82

Vul Both ♣ A10732 ♠ AQJ4 ♠ 2 ♥ K7 ♥ AQJ1083 ♦ J10943 ♦ A76 ♣ Q4 ♣ K98 ♠ 108765 ♥ 62 ♦ KQ5 ♣ J65

NW E S

R 13 ♠ A9 Bd 12 ♥ 1053 Dlr W ♦ QJ872

Vul NS ♣ AJ2 ♠ Q652 ♠ K73 ♥ Q9762 ♥ K4 ♦ 43 ♦ 106 ♣ 105 ♣ K98643 ♠ J1084 ♥ AJ8 ♦ AK95 ♣ Q7

NW E S

R 6 ♠ AK842 Bd 18 ♥ K1032 Dlr E ♦ 987

Vul NS ♣ K ♠ Q6 ♠ 1075 ♥ AQJ6 ♥ 98754 ♦ QJ1063 ♦ 542 ♣ Q9 ♣ 75 ♠ J93 ♥ — ♦ AK ♣ AJ1086432

NW E S

W N E S P 1C 1D 1H P 1S X 4S P 5S P 6S All pass

Dlr N ♠ AQ10743 Vul None ♥ 2 ♦ A83

♣ A65 ♠ J ♠ K85 ♥ KQJ75 ♥ A983 ♦ Q107 ♦ K64 ♣ K843 ♣ Q92 ♠ 962 ♥ 1064 ♦ J952 ♣ J107

NW E S

W N E S 1S P P 2H 2S 2NT* P 3H 3S P P 4H All pass

T h e Q B A B u l l e t i n J u l y - S e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2

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ruling that I didn't fully understand at the table, but later realised as fair. It rightly took away our +420 that we didn't deserve for our out of tempo auction, while maintaining the –420 in the opponent's card for they didn't deserve a better score for bad defence.Here is one where I failed to make a 3NT contract.

1 Asking to describe his hand2 3 hearts and maximum

The spade lead was ducked in dummy, covered by the queen and I won with the king. I now played the diamond, finessing and losing to the king. South returned a spade to the ace. Communication problems now prompted me to play the ♦A and another, hoping to either drop the queen or rely on clubs breaking 3-3 to make the contract. If the diamond queen dropped, I have nine tricks in 3 spades, 3 diamonds and 3 clubs. As the cards lie I went one down. So how could I have made this contract? Neville said that if I led a heart towards the jack at trick two, he would have given me a hug. Thank god I didn't play a heart at the table. But playing a heart at trick two has some logic. If clubs break you have nine tricks in 3 spades, 1 diamond and 5 clubs. If clubs don't break you have communication problems making 9 tricks in other suits anyway. So there is no harm in testing hearts early. Even if hearts are 4-2 opponents might not be able to cash out. As you can see

the heart play at trick two hits the jackpot as North has the ace and king of hearts. Declarer can now make 9 tricks in 3 spades, 2 hearts, 1 diamond and 3 clubs.An alternative line for success would have been to go for the double finesse in diamonds by playing a club to the ace at trick 4. When the second diamond finesse works, run clubs losing a fourth club to South. Declarer can afford to discard two hearts. The best South can do now is to play the third diamond. Declarer can cash the fifth club winner discarding the fourth diamond. The ninth trick will come from either a heart or spade depending on what north discards on clubs.This was my first visit to Darwin, and whenever I was away from the waterfront strip I had the feeling that I was not in Australia (People and Terrain). Jimmy did an excellent job as captain of the Open and Senior teams. The highlight being when I fell sick and had to pull out at the last minute. Jim made a dash to Mike and Betty's apartment and pulled Betty out of the pool to make up the team.Now we have some hands from the Seniors Teams.The Senior team never threatened and was also troubled by unforced errors. They never really got going to the best of their ability. However everyone was positive and tried hard.

From Ian and PaulForget about practised partnerships of longstanding being the key to success at the ANC. It could be all about who does or does not bid the club grand. We were sitting EW against NSW.

West had a spade with his clubs to start with hence the 2S opening rather than the normal 3S. 4NT showed 2 places to play and our insufficient 4S bid gave the opposition 2 chances to show them. South compounded his error in not bidding 5C (correctible) over 4S and did not pull pard's double to 7C (who could blame him) which makes on a non-heart lead which West may not find. The result was +1660EW.

Dlr W ♠ 109432 Vul Both ♥ AK10 ♦ Q73

♣ J10 ♠ KJ7 ♠ A5 ♥ Q832 ♥ J65 ♦ J642 ♦ A109 ♣ A5 ♣ KQ432 ♠ Q86 ♥ 974 ♦ K85 ♣ 9876

NW E S

W N E S P P 1C P 1H P 2H P 2NT1 P 3D2 P 3NT All pass

R 7 ♠ 8 Bd 7 ♥ 4 Dlr S ♦ AKQJ97

Vul Both ♣ AK1074 ♠ AJ107532 ♠ KQ964 ♥ K8 ♥ AQJ62 ♦ 4 ♦ 653 ♣ J95 ♣ — ♠ — ♥ 109753 ♦ 1082 ♣ Q8632

NW E S

W N E S P 2S! 4NT 4S! P P 5D 5S P P 6C 6S P P X All pass

The Senior team: Lech Kaszubski, Ian Affllick, Keith McDonald, Jim Evans (npc), David Harrison, Paul Collins and Andy Slater.

T h e Q B A B u l l e t i n J u l y - S e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2

12

At the other table West opened 3S, North bid 5D at his first turn and bid 6D over 5S rather than show his second suit so South had a less difficult decision over 6SX. North led a club from his shorter suit rather than a diamond so 13 tricks rolled in for +1860EW and 5 IMPS out. It could have been huge for either side!QLD (EW) v. WA

A slight brain fade by the WA North meant a lot of IMPS were swinging on the diamond finesse. Luckily for QLD this failed and our teammates stopped in 6NT for 17 IMPs in, rather than 13 out. A swing of 30 IMPs.QLD (EW) v. SA

Over 1C (artificial) from West, North bid 1D and East doubled, South passed and West bid a forcing 1S. North with the room now bids 2C and we bid our way to a seemingly confident 6H. After some thought South sacrificed in 7CX for –1100 vs –1430 in the other room and 8 IMPS out.

Seeing we finished on the right side of the ledger (marginally) on those 3 boards overall perhaps it was not all about the club grand battle after all. More analysis required … yes, that could be the answer!From David and LechWhat do you bid when you are dealt the West hand?

Well, if your Multi-2D includes 7 or 8 playing tricks in any suit you have it covered. After a 2NT enquiry from partner your 3NT bid says you have the tricks in a minor and 3NT becomes your final contract. Switch now to the defender on lead (South).At our table Margaret Bourke chose the somewhat mechanical ♥6, and 9 tricks to declarer followed rapidly to give us one of our very few successes in the matter.It is always best to start off with an ace and have a look against such bidding.South opened 4S, partner bid 4NT for take-out and you are playing 5D from East.

You trump the opening lead of the ♠A in dummy and have to tackle the trump suit. You lead small and the jack appears from North, and hoping

there may be a stiff ace with South, you duck, but South follows small.Another spade from North taken by the king. Now you need to get back to dummy to lead trumps again - clubs look like the best bet but, alas, South is void and scores his last diamond - one down.With the wisdom of hindsight the foolproof way back to dummy was to trump your ♠K. Also deep into the postmortem you also realise that South could not possibly have had the stiff ace as he must have the ♦9, otherwise North would have played that card instead of the jack!5SX, one off at the other table meant another bad board.Betty Lee and Mike Robson came second overall in the datums, great work. In conclusion, I would also like to thank Alan Gibson for organising the BBO practice sessions and Bill Hunt for his expert advice on tactics and managing the teams. I think this helped our placing and good results overall. ■

R 9 ♠ KQJ8 Bd 18 ♥ AJ95 Dlr E ♦ 87

Vul NS ♣ AKQ ♠ 75 ♠ 109432 ♥ Q1063 ♥ K874 ♦ K102 ♦ 654 ♣ 10984 ♣ 6 ♠ A6 ♥ 2 ♦ AQJ93 ♣ J7532

NW E S

W N E S P 1D P 1H P 2C P 2S P 3C P 4C P 4H P 7C!! All pass

R 14 ♠ 62 Bd 3 ♥ 6 Dlr S ♦ AQ5432

Vul EW ♣ AQ98 ♠ AKQ10853 ♠ 4 ♥ KQ1082 ♥ AJ95 ♦ 9 ♦ K1076 ♣ — ♣ K642 ♠ J97 ♥ 743 ♦ J8 ♣ J10753

NW E S

R 5 ♠ AKQ2 Bd 16 ♥ 105 Dlr W ♦ 10875

Vul EW ♣ 1076 ♠ 3 ♠ 109876 ♥ 32 ♥ KQJ7 ♦ J6 ♦ K32 ♣ AKJ98532 ♣ 4 ♠ J54 ♥ A9864 ♦ AQ94 ♣ Q

NW E S

R 3 ♠ J5 Bd 15 ♥ 76 Dlr S ♦ AQJ

Vul NS ♣ J75432 ♠ — ♠ K6 ♥ AJ532 ♥ KQ98 ♦ 10732 ♦ K862 ♣ AK106 ♣ Q98 ♠ AQ10987432 ♥ 104 ♦ 94 ♣ —

NW E S

Nathan van Jole

The Youth

TH E A u s t r a l i a n N a t i o n a l Championships for 2012 was

held at the convention centre in Darwin. Once again QLD had its usual struggles to make up the numbers to be able to participate. Fortunately we were able to enter as a team of 5, consisting of myself, Tom Wix, Chris Larter, Jessica Brake and Andy Hung as a late addition. Prior to the event our partnerships were lined up as Brake/Larter, and Hung/Wix/van Jole rotating. We were to play 3 round robins against the 5 other states, 15 x 20 board matches in total. However after a lacklustre first round robin I decided that our best chance would be to split the current partnerships up, and have myself and Hung anchor at separate tables. This worked a treat in the second round robin as we scored 265.5 out of a possible 337.5 to move us into a clear

T h e Q B A B u l l e t i n J u l y - S e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2

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second place. The third round robin was much tougher, and things had come down to the wire. We held onto second place until the very last round where we were to play the leaders, WA. Unfortunately a very strong (and underperforming) NSW team leap- frogged us both into first position, and we did not get a sufficient result against WA to overtake them, and as such had to settle for 3rd place. The final between WA and NSW was won by WA.Board 7 of the 7th match was probably the most interesting of the tournament.

Open Room

Closed Room

The datum suggests that Wix and myself did well on the board but that is pretty generous. There are plenty of different actions over 3S that the North hand could take. Double, 4NT, 4D are all very reasonable choices for their own reasons. I chose double, on the logic that I have seen these types of hands before, and the chances of defending 3SX looked pretty unlikely. The advantage of starting with a double or a natural 4D bid is that you may lure the opponents into thinking their hands are more defensive than they really are. Andy took a very good action in the

closed room by taking an insurance bid of 6S. It is rarely right to defend with these types of hands, however admittedly I am thankful that I, as North, was not given the problem over 6S. Maybe my partner would save me on our auction? It all seems very tricky to me and guesswork. +1540 and +1660 was worth 22 IMPS on one board. We felt a little aggrieved that North had chosen the ♦A lead vs 6SX (the longer of the two suits), and saved the overtrick. In match 13, board 13 was also a good pickup for our team thanks to some aggressive (and lucky!) bidding.

In the closed room NS managed to get to 2C making for +90. In the open room I decided to take an optimistic

R 7 ♠ 8 Bd 7 ♥ 4 Dlr S ♦ AKQJ97

Vul Both ♣ AK1074 ♠ AJ107532 ♠ KQ964 ♥ K8 ♥ AQJ62 ♦ 4 ♦ 653 ♣ J95 ♣ — ♠ — ♥ 109753 ♦ 1082 ♣ Q8632

NW E S

W N E S Munro van Jole Pattison Wix P 3S X 4S P P 5D 5S P P 6C X All pass

W N E S Brake Moskovsky Hung Thompson P 3S 4NT 5S 6C P P 6S P P X All pass

R 13 ♠ A9543 Bd 13 ♥ KJ96 Dlr N ♦ 3

Vul Both ♣ 1052 ♠ 762 ♠ KJ8 ♥ Q1084 ♥ 53 ♦ 872 ♦ K10965 ♣ AK6 ♣ Q98 ♠ Q10 ♥ A72 ♦ AQJ4 ♣ J743

NW E S

W N E S Howard van Jole Thompson Wix P P 1D P 1S P 1NT P 2C P 2D P 2H P 3NT All pass

view with the North cards and showed my hand as invitational with 5 spades and 4 hearts. This would usually show around 11HCPs but on this occasion I have good shape, some nice sharp cards, good intermediate cards, and in a fit my hand looks like it may play well (opposite Kxx Qxx Axxx KJx/xx AQxx Axxx KJx/etc). Bidding tight games is definitely a big winner in teams bridge (especially when vul.), but not even my optimistic self saw much hope in the contract when Tom bid 3NT, denying a fit and showing a maximum hand.Fortunately the hand fits very well and things sat very well for Tom. The defence started with 3 rounds of clubs (can you blame them?) and when that didn't work, East switched to a diamond. Tom won the diamond return in hand with the queen and was left to negotiate the spade suit. What to do next isn't clear-cut. At this stage you have 6 top tricks (♠A, ♥A, ♥K, ♦A, ♦Q, ♣J). Whilst a spade from dummy towards the Q10 (putting in the 10 if RHO plays low) is the percentage line, it will require a heart entry to do so. Since you need to preserve the ♥K as an entry for spades later in the hand, it requires a heart finesse, which is risky in itself because you have already lost 3 tricks, and 1 certain spade trick, and a failing heart finesse would be the end of your chances. The alternative is playing the ♠Q towards dummy, playing for LHO to have KJx. But the 10 will actually cause a blockage, as

Half the Women's team: Rosa Lachman, Toni Bardon and Sandra Johnson

T h e Q B A B u l l e t i n J u l y - S e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2

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East lead a trump to prevent South ruffing 3 clubs in dummy - too hard.Board 6 on Sunday morning was interesting. Margaret, sitting W, was in 3NT.

Margaret had bid clubs twice and when I supported clubs, she bid 3NT hoping the clubs were coming in. North needs to make an impossible lead, the ♦A and then put South in with the ♦Q who can lead a heart. It didn’t happen, as North led the ♥Q and a short time later we were scoring 11 tricks.

On Sunday morning, we played this board against Jim Evans and Larry Moses. After Margaret managed to

stop opposition chatter at the table (no mean effort when Jimmy Evans was there!) she opened 4H and Jim, with his lovely hand, bid 5S. Larry, with 1 trick to offer, bid on to 6S. The results on the net show that Jim was in good company, but unfortunately for him it doesn’t make.

Board 31 in the same session, found us (EW) in 3NT - a much better spot than a partscore, although I was worried that I hadn’t been cautious enough about my hand. After a reverse Margaret wants to know if I have any useful cards in her suits and to re-assess my hand accordingly. Anyway, Margaret was playing it!Margaret is a wonderful partner, steady as a rock. A month or so ago, Neville Francis gave me some advice in Darwin. He said I had to “toughen up”. When I asked him what he meant, he said I had to cut out the little mistakes. Good advice, worth listening to. I cut out some of them!An exciting and rewarding weekend of bridge - can’t wait for next year! ■

WHEN we started play on the first day, we would have been

happy to win the Women’s, so the final outcome was quite a treat!We had a lot of luck along the way. One hand that stands out was board 30 on the second afternoon.

After EW bid their way to 4S, I decided to try 5D with my shapely hand - which was doubled of course as EW held most of the points.Poor West had a very difficult lead because the only way you can defeat it is to underlead the ♥A! This lets

QBA Butler Pairs

Dlr W ♠ 4 Vul EW ♥ KQ98643 ♦ QJ87

♣ 10 ♠ 87 ♠ AQJ9653 ♥ 105 ♥ A ♦ A109532 ♦ K4 ♣ QJ9 ♣ A63 ♠ K102 ♥ J72 ♦ 6 ♣ K87542

NW E S

Dlr S ♠ K97 Vul NS ♥ 5432 ♦ Q98

♣ A64 ♠ 3 ♠ QJ8542 ♥ AQ76 ♥ 8 ♦ AJ102 ♦ K54 ♣ KQ105 ♣ J82 ♠ A106 ♥ KJ109 ♦ 763 ♣ 973

NW E S

Dlr E ♠ 1042 Vul EW ♥ AQJ9 ♦ A106

♣ J108 ♠ AQ53 ♠ KJ ♥ K10 ♥ 532 ♦ K ♦ J9752 ♣ KQ9654 ♣ A73 ♠ 9876 ♥ 8764 ♦ Q843 ♣ 2

NW E S

Dlr E ♠ J953 Vul None ♥ Q10982 ♦ 982

♣ 6 ♠ 876 ♠ AKQ1042 ♥ AJ64 ♥ K75 ♦ K5 ♦ 3 ♣ J753 ♣ KQ9 ♠ — ♥ 3 ♦ AQJ10764 ♣ A10842

NW E S

LHO could cover the queen and duck the 10 meaning you once again are reliant on the heart finesse to gain entry to dummy twice.Tom was able to prevail; he finessed the ♥J and played a spade to the ten. When this held, he gave up a spade and later when spades broke 3/3, claimed 9 tricks for +11 IMPS. The ANC is a great opportunity for youth players all across Australia to get together in a competitive and fun environment. If you are under 25, a member of a QBA club, and wish to be considered for this team next year please contact me urgently (nvanjole@gmail.com). It doesn't matter what your level is, as long as you have a desire to play competitive bridge and a willingness to learn you will certainly be considered. ■

Half the Men's winners: Ralph Parker - Peter Hainsworth the other

Women's and winners overall: Margaret Millar and

Carolyn Woolley

Carolyn Woolley

T h e Q B A B u l l e t i n J u l y - S e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2

15

It all comes down to the size of the trump fit of course, and sometimes the rules need to be broken. With a huge trump fit, you should go on, eg

Bidding: 1S (3C) 3S (5C) ? You have a strong 6-card suit, plus a void in the opponent’s suit. Invite slam by bidding 5H; this is a cue-bid showing a heart control, and asking partner to choose between 5S and 6S.QCBC had requested Declarer Play Techniques, and 8 interesting hands were played there, with discussion after each. The fact that trumps should not be drawn as fast as possible on each hand was the main ingredient of the lesson. The PLAN is everything and if you can afford to draw trumps straight away, then so be it, but on about half the hands played, you need to do something else first. That is usually discarding a loser on a winner, or setting up a side suit by ruffing, or most commonly, ruffing losers when there is a shortage in the dummy. On this hand a simple count of the losers from the outset will show that there are one too many:

Lead the ♠Q. The plan will reveal 4 losers: one in spades, two in hearts, and one in diamonds. That’s one too many. Trumps can’t be drawn immediately because the defenders will make their deep spade trick when in with the ace and king of trumps. What to do? Win

signalling methods, Attitude, Count and Suit Preference. David and I both feel that simple is best, and high or low to encourage will get the message across perfectly well rather than complicated signalling methods. We talked in terms of high to encourage, but low is probably even more popular these days. Keeping parity with dummy’s length combined with attitude signals is the theme on this hand: how would you defend?

Lead: ♥QThe defence will take three hearts tricks, and then switch to a diamond. If North is on lead, they will play the ♦K, and South should play the ♦7 (high encouraging). East wins the ♦A and runs off five spade tricks. What cards does North discard? Answer: North must keep all four clubs. Discard the ♦Q (remember that partner encouraged diamonds, and will have an honour hopefully), and keep parity in clubs with dummy.The next lesson at my club in New Farm (New Farm Bowls Club), covered bidding - a rather special topic that captured everyone’s imagination - High Level Bidding Decisions. One of David’s areas of expertise in teaching (and playing) is this - when to bid 5 over 5, when to double, when to pass. When you bid to game, and your opponents bid over this to the 5-level, it is rarely right to bid 5 over 5. You are likely to receive a plus score by defending, and bidding on may turn a positive into a negative.

♠ 6 ♥ A985 ♦ KQ43

♣ 9652 ♠ QJ9 ♠ AK1084 ♥ K64 ♥ 732 ♦ 985 ♦ A10 ♣ Q874 ♣ AK3 ♠ 7532 ♥ QJ10 ♦ J762 ♣ J10

NW E S

W N E S 1S P 2S P 4S All pass

Joan Butts

Dlr N ♠ AK7 ♥ Q9874 ♦ 65

♣ KQ6 ♠ 854 ♠ QJ109 ♥ AK3 ♥ 2 ♦ J1093 ♦ A872 ♣ 1092 ♣ 8543 ♠ 632 ♥ J1065 ♦ KQ4 ♣ AJ7

NW E S

W N E S 1H P 3H P 4H All pass

Teaching Tour with David Beauchamp and Joan Butts

DAVID Beauchamp, a leading Sydney player and popular

teacher, was available for a few days after the Barrier Reef Congress, to do some workshops with me, so I canvassed all clubs in the drivable area. We offered a variety of topics, and by far the most popular, chosen by the players, was defence. Next came declarer play, and lastly, bidding. I didn’t expect this, but I guess local teachers concentrate mainly on bidding, so perhaps players were keen for something different. We were only too pleased to get started.Seven clubs took up our offer, Sunshine Coast, CARDS Bridge Centre, QCBC, Kenmore, Redlands, Surfers Paradise and Sanctuary Cove, and over four days, we taught more than 300 players, from novice to advanced. The lessons were pitched at a “regular” player level, not too complex and not too easy - you could call them “multi-level” in that most players gained something from them.The Sunshine Coast Club workshop was Talk to Your Partner while you Defend, and covered the three main

♠ AQJ1076♥ A54♦ KQ62 ♣ —

Teaching Tour

Joan and David

T h e Q B A B u l l e t i n J u l y - S e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2

16

topic – Avoid Common Mistakes While you Defend. The main points here were:(1) Be aware of how many defensive tricks we require.(2) Play our suits, not their suits.(3) Avoid establishing dummy’s honour cards.The final day was at the South Coast. Surfers Paradise, first, and then Sanctuary Cove Club, a newly formed QBA club. The topics selected here were Defence and High level Decisions. David was very impressed when one pair here managed to find the only (brilliant) defence to break the contract, in a hand from High Level Decisions.

* SplinterThe contract will make most of the time, unless the defence find this great sequence of plays: Lead ♦3 to ♦A. Now a low club is returned to West’s ♣K, and another diamond is played, and ruffed by East! Wow. If any teacher would like to have the notes and hand records for any of the workshops, to run them at their own club, they should email me: joan@joanbuttsbridge.com I think that David was pleased to see that bridge and teaching north of the border is very much alive and well! ■

the ♠A, and play a diamond up to the KQ4. If the ace is onside, it will allow you to discard the losing spade on the ♦K/Q. You need to make this play twice though, before it will work for you. At Kenmore, the keen novices wanted to work on Play in No Trumps. This is a subject that fills new players with dread – they are terrified of losing control in no trumps. As usual, it’s all about the plan, and then asking yourself if you are able to reach the winners in dummy when you have gone about your plan. Techniques available in no trump play are: Promotion, length and the finesse. Often the lead must necessarily be lost while the suit is being established. You need to both get the lead back, and then to make sure you can reach your winners.

Lead: ♠5. Declarer makes their plan. There are 8 winners: 2 in spades, 2 in hearts, 2 in diamonds, and 2 in clubs. The extra trick will be found in diamonds, using the technique of length. Your side has 8 diamonds, and they have 5. Assuming they divide 3-2, there will be winners in the diamond suit, four to be precise.However, the problem is getting to the dummy to enjoy the long diamonds. You can’t play ♦A and then ♦K here, because you won’t be able to get to dummy later. The clue is to lose (duck) a diamond early, to keep communications there, so that you are able to enjoy your winners there in the long run!We offered another defence lesson at Redlands, but this time on a different

Dlr S ♠ K753 ♥ AQJ5 ♦ J1074

♣ 3 ♠ 86 ♠ 2 ♥ 43 ♥ 976 ♦ Q98653 ♦ A ♣ K64 ♣ AQJ109752 ♠ AQJ1094 ♥ K1082 ♦ K2 ♣ 8

NW E S

W N E S 1S P 4C* 5C 5S All pass

Dlr N ♠ AQ2 Vul ♥ AK7 ♦ 653

♣ AK53 ♠ 106 ♠ KJ954 ♥ Q1065 ♥ J93 ♦ QJ9 ♦ 108 ♣ QJ107 ♣ 864 ♠ 873 ♥ 842 ♦ AK742 ♣ 92

NW E S

W N E S 2NT P 3NT All pass

Sunshine Coast Congress

THIS is a weekend I always look forward to playing in - great

venue, well organised by Convenor Marion Bucens and Director Peter Busch, and fantastic food. The sandwiches are made by the local Meals on Wheels Ladies and are the best I have ever tasted, but now for the bridge.It always adds an extra interest when your teammates are real life partners or who have partners competing in rival teams. I was playing with Pele Rankin in the teams and her husband Paul Hooykaas had teamed up with Neville Francis, Ralph Parker and Nathan Van Jole to be the number 1 seeds and looked to be formidable opposition. Pele and I were playing with Toni Bardon and Jim Wallis - life partners for over 20 years and they have played in every Sunshine Coast Pairs and Teams for the last 24 years. (It is the only bridge event they play together.) To spice things up even further Pele had taken a bet with Neville that we would finish ahead of them, and he had eagerly accepted.Neville and Paul set the pace when they cruised to victory in the Pairs ahead of Andy Slater/Ken Dawson with Steve Brookes/Adrian Mayers third. Margaret Weldon/Robin Brown won the B Section and Greg O’Connor/Pam Nearhos were best placed under 100 MPs. I played with Larry Norden in the pairs and cleverly managed to get many bad bids out of my system (including bidding a slam off 2 Keycards because I could not subtract 3 from 5 - sorry Larry!) Toni and Jim dusted off the cobwebs making many people very happy in the process but did not trouble the scorers. Things were not looking so good for our team on current form!.A new day and we were off and running with two good wins and well in front.

The difference between a brave bid and a foolhardy bid is largely a matter of result.

Edgar Kaplan

Therese Tully

T h e Q B A B u l l e t i n J u l y - S e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2

17

Moreton-Bribie Congress

This hand helped - I was East.

Playing Acol I knew that West held 4 clubs so bid 6C, leaving the opponents the last guess, and North succumbed to temptation and took the save. This resulting in +2000 and 17 IMPs to the good guys!Next match was the head to head which we lost 21-9 and dropped to 4th place giving them the lead and the sessional wine prizes much to our dismay! It seemed to be that 4S contracts were our nemesis as we dropped 24 IMPs in 2 boards.

After South pre-empted with 3D I played 4S from W which was quickly defeated when the opposition forced me to ruff and I lost control. Our teammates had the opportunity to defeat another 4S to match the result in our room. One defender was in a position to cash the setting trick but went for the jugular to get 2 off and thereby confusing poor partner who went awry allowing the contract to make. Partner did apologize and

say she should have got it right but there is a lesson here for all - take the setting trick and then worry about the extras unless you are sure you and partner are on the same wavelength!.We managed to claw our way back to 2nd with one round to go so the stage was set for an exciting finish. This board provided some action.

Pele and I sat EW and we had no problem cruising to 3NT making 10 tricks on an uninterrupted auction. In the other room after 2 passes Jimmy (South) decided he had a good hand worthy of a 1H opening! West bid 5C and Toni bid a confident 5H. Toni was disappointed to see this drift 3 off but it was 10 IMPs in the bag and after a nervous wait we found we had won by a nose - 1VP!How sweet it was! I was only sorry I hadn’t had the courage of Pele’s convictions and placed a bet myself!See you all next year! ■

Dlr N ♠ K10932 Vul EW ♥ Q843 ♦ K52

♣ 5 ♠ Q ♠ A764 ♥ 6 ♥ AJ7 ♦ A1087 ♦ 964 ♣ AKQ10432 ♣ 976 ♠ J85 ♥ K10952 ♦ QJ3 ♣ J8

NW E S

Dlr S ♠ K652 Vul EW ♥ A752 ♦ 1064

♣ A9 ♠ AQ843 ♠ J97 ♥ 8 ♥ QJ1096 ♦ A ♦ J2 ♣ KQJ1062 ♣ 853 ♠ 10 ♥ K43 ♦ KQ98753 ♣ 74

NW E S

Dlr S ♠ J6532 Vul None ♥ 9 ♦ J9652

♣ K3 ♠ A98 ♠ KQ104 ♥ K74 ♥ AQ863 ♦ AKQ ♦ — ♣ J872 ♣ AQ54 ♠ 7 ♥ J1052 ♦ 108743 ♣ 1096

NW E S

W N E S P 1C 2NT 6C P P 6D P P X All pass The Teams winners: Jim Wallis, Therese Tully,

Toni Bardon and Pele Rankin

Minor Issues at Bribie

SLAM contracts are one of the excitement generators of bridge.

Lots of IMPs rest on these decisions and minor suit slams seem particularly difficult to find. Slam decisions at the Bribie-Moreton teams gained the Pakradeo (Bill Hunt-Pranjal Chakradeo; Malcolm Carter-Nikolas Moore) team 50 IMPs and so were very significant in our win.

The Pairs winners: Neville Francis and Paul Hooykaas

Malcolm Carter

T h e Q B A B u l l e t i n J u l y - S e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2

18

It’s interesting to note that we had at best a 50% success rate in the following minor suit slams and this suggests that many partnerships would benefit from re-appraising their methods.To the hands in question.This one was from the first round with Bill and Pranjal sitting NS.

The slam needs the spade finesse, to be played by North and have a 2-2 diamond break or singleton ♦Q. There are also some plus factors in clubs if the ♠K is wrong, about a 30% slam. But it could easily be a lay down. What are your methods with big hands? The bidding of very strong hands with only the need for a few specific cards is very uncertain. Against us our opponents settled in the safe 3NT making 10 tricks.

Dlr E ♠ 62 Vul NS ♥ Q102 ♦ 9853

♣ J763 ♠ 9853 ♠ KJ107 ♥ 8653 ♥ KJ97 ♦ 64 ♦ Q10 ♣ Q82 ♣ 954 ♠ AQ4 ♥ A4 ♦ AKJ72 ♣ AK10

NW E S

W N E S P 2C P 2D P 3D P 4D P 6D All pass

In the next match Nikolas and I were EW. We play Blue Club and this features canapé bidding (if 2 suits are bid the second suit is as long or longer than the first suit) and a strong 1C opening on 17+ HCPs with some very specialized responses.

The 2S shows 15-16 po in ts concentrated in spades and diamonds with at least 5 spades and 4 diamonds. I feel we settled for game too easily. With a good red suit fit a slam could have been envisioned and Blue Club gave us the information about suit quality. Whilst all 13 tricks can be made in either red suit because of the favourable heart position a more normal heart loser means the timing is delicate in either slam. We gained a fortunate 13 IMPs when our opponents reached 6S. What

Dlr EW ♠ 63 Vul S ♥ QJ ♦ 763

♣ AKQ432 ♠ AKQ82 ♠ 5 ♥ 9762 ♥ AK104 ♦ AK92 ♦ Q1085 ♣ — ♣ 9865 ♠ J974 ♥ 853 ♦ J4 ♣ J107

NW E S

W N E S P 1D 2C X P 2S P 2NT P 3H P 4H All pass

are your mechanisms to describe trump support? Can you distinguish between hands with good and bad trumps. One of the more difficult cards to cue bid is the trump ace or king. We use the NT bid in a cue bidding sequence to show trump controls. The next hand features a 90% slam that we comfortably missed.

2D shows a re-biddable diamond suit and a minimum hand. Clearly this is wrong, I should have ignored point count and rebid 3D, technically showing an unbalanced 6-card suit and some 15-16 points. Strangely it’s very easy to bid if I pass! This allows partner to open 1C and rebid 1NT, showing 17-19 balanced, and our methods allow me to determine the 4-3-3-3 shape and 7 controls below 3NT and allows for an easy 6D. If I persist with my questions I can find 6NT.How would you do? Do you have the weapons to reach the slam after a strong NT?

Dlr S ♠ 972 Vul Nil ♥ KJ1092 ♦ Q4

♣ 964 ♠ 3 ♠ AJ84 ♥ 85 ♥ A74 ♦ AK109872 ♦ J63 ♣ QJ10 ♣ AK8 ♠ KQ1065 ♥ Q63 ♦ 5 ♣ 7532

NW E S

W N E S P 1D P 1S P 2D P 3NT All pass

The Teams winners: Pranjal Chakradeo, Nikolas Moore, Malcolm Carter and Bill Hunt

It is not the handling of difficult hands that makes the winning player. There aren't enough of them. It is the ability to avoid messing up the easy ones.

Alan Sontag

‘Even the best opponents should be given the chance to err.’

Victor Mollo

T h e Q B A B u l l e t i n J u l y - S e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2

19

with a club ruff, pull the outstanding trump and claim 10 tricks. At the other table the deal was passed-in. Here is one that misfired.

1 4th suit2 Pick a slam

Once again as South I picked up this 10 HCP hand, but boy wasn't she sexy! I opened 1S and partner bid 2H (2/1 game force). 3D from partner was fourth suit so I bid 3S hoping he would bid 3NT. When partner bid 4D I was in trouble and tried 4S. Who can blame partner for pushing onto slam. 5NT was choice of slams, and the bidding spree finally came to an end with 6H.Partner did well to go only one down, while teammates did their best to defeat 4H at the other table - to make this a flat board. So how did the rest of the field fare on this board? NS in only seven of the 22 tables stayed low and managed a plus score. The postmortem with my partner was for the sake of record and continuous improvement. Opening 1S was fine; the 3C rebid was aggressive (veterans suggested 2S); having bid 3C - a 4C bid over 3D would have informed partner of a possible low point count but shapely opening, and partner may have applied the brakes and settled short of slam. I can hear the gallery yelling, "That is wishful thinking, given the monster hand that North held!" ■

Graded TeamsFinally a triumph for the system and science on the final board!

I was West and my opening bid showed 17+ points, partner showed a balanced 11-13 hand with 1NT and I asked a series of questions up to my final bid of 6C.2D showed at least one 4-card major2NT - 4 spades and a 4-card minor3D - 4 clubs and a 3-card diamond suit (3H would be 4 clubs and 3 hearts, 3S - 4 diamonds and 3 clubs etc.)3H was a control ask and 3S would have been 0-2 controls; 3NT - 3 controls. I know that partner has the heart or club ace plus one of the kings and at least another 4 points. Clearly it is worth going on.4C is a request for negative cue bids. This asks partner to bypass suits with an A, K or Q. The bid of 4H guarantees the ♣A or ♣Q and denies anything in spades. 4S asks partner to continue bypassing 4NT and 5C the ♦K or Q plus the ♥A. This just about underwrites the club slam.I know this looks complex but the reality is that instead of suits representing suits they are steps and thus quite easily remembered. Can your methods reach this slam? ■

Dlr W ♠ KQ9 Vul None ♥ 10742 ♦ J654

♣ 94 ♠ A2 ♠ 10854 ♥ KQJ93 ♥ A5 ♦ A8 ♦ KQ2 ♣ KJ102 ♣ Q876 ♠ J763 ♥ 86 ♦ 10973 ♣ A53

NW E S

W N E S 1C P 1NT P 2C P 2D P 2H P 2NT P 3C P 3D P 3H P 3NT P 4C P 4H P 4S P 5D P 6C All pass

SEVEN years ago, as a member of an all Gold Coast team (Darko

Janzekovic, John Pritchard, Bianca Barden), I tried some unusual bids to unsettle our opposition and won this event against all odds. This year, playing with three tigers (Neville, Ralph and Nathan), I decided to let the tigers roar while I bid 'normally'. The strategy almost backfired, but we just about managed to win the event averaging a low VP count of less than 19.Here is a couple of hands where my bidding came under scrutiny, despite my pledge to be 'normal'.

* Michael's (hearts and a minor)As South I had 10 HCP, but the 5-card spade suit, an ace and two kings as well as the singleton prompted me to open 1S. West bid 2S (Michaels) and my partner raised to 4S. I won the ♦J lead with the king in dummy and played the ♠J. East rose with the ace and returned a diamond. I played the ten and West ruffed. West now played the ace and another club which I won with the king in dummy and discarded a heart from my hand. I now played a spade to my ten, finessing the queen, and ruffed a diamond with the last spade in dummy. I could now return to hand

Dlr S ♠ J83 Vul None ♥ A102 ♦ K3

♣ K9732 ♠ 94 ♠ AQ2 ♥ QJ753 ♥ 86 ♦ J ♦ Q96542 ♣ AJ1086 ♣ Q4 ♠ K10765 ♥ K94 ♦ A1087 ♣ 5

NW E S

W N E S 1S 2S 4S All pass

Dlr E ♠ 6 Vul Both ♥ AKQ84 ♦ AKQ84

♣ 54 ♠ Q10843 ♠ A ♥ J76 ♥ 10532 ♦ 6532 ♦ J1097 ♣ 6 ♣ KJ93 ♠ KJ9752 ♥ 9 ♦ — ♣ AQ10872

NW E S

W N E S P 1S P 2H P 3C P 3D1 P 3S P 4D P 4S P 5NT2 P 6C P 6D P 6H All pass

A contract is neither good nor bad, but playing makes it so.

Victor Mollo

Kamal Sanmugarasa

T h e Q B A B u l l e t i n J u l y - S e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2

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Alan Boyce

B Grade

IF you’ve never played in a QBA event, where the event is a state title,

I can wholeheartedly recommend that you pencil them into your annual bridge calendar. While success in one of these events is extremely gratifying, I can state categorically that the standard of bridge is no different from what you should expect to encounter in a reasonable standard club session. In fact, the key to success in congresses,

from my experience, is to be the pair or team that makes the fewest mistakes; open when you should, be prepared to defend when it’s right to, and make contracts that should and can be made.Very few games are made by a brilliant endplay, or grand coup, rather games might be well bid on one table and missed on others.The team of myself, Andrew Woollons, Jack Rohde and Lex Ranke eventually came out on top on this occasion after a slowish start. Matches 3 and 4 mainly set us up for the day's victory, with match 3 against the day’s top seeds being probably the key. Being a teams event, scoring was by IMPs, and all but 1 IMP was achieved in 4 of the 9 boards.

A big swing occurred on board 20 in this match.

At both tables West opened 1S with a marginal hand, but the concentration of values in the majors and the glorious 6-4-2-1 shape was sufficient enticement to spur West into action.Both Norths overcalled 2D holding and at our table my partner decided to jump to 4S. This was based on the limit nature of my opening, where 1S is limited to 15 hcps in our strong club system. It was a somewhat marginal bid perhaps, with such a strong defensive hand if diamonds became trumps, but subsequent results showed the benefit of taking such action with a fit and nice shape. This was passed out.I’m not clear how East responded at the other table but South bid 4C which was subsequently raised to 5C by North.4S had no play provided the defence found their ruffs and and it went two off (–200). However 6C is on NS so 5C saw a resultant score of +620 by our team-mates for a well discovered vulnerable game on the home table and 9 IMPs. This spoke volumes for taking action with shapely hands. Interestingly, 5 pairs out of 22 found 5C in the A Grade event (all making), with 3 doubled. We eventually won this match 22-8 which brought us back to mid-field at the lunch break and with 22, 19 and 18 VPs in the afternoon’s match, we managed a narrow win “when the music stopped”.This was my first win a level beyond C grade or Novice. But of course it takes 2 or in this case 4 to tango, and as I look down the scores we all played a strong part in this success. So, here’s to us, the “four amigos”. ■B Grade winners: Alan Boyce, Lex Ranke, Andrew Woolens and Jack Rohde

Dlr W ♠ A3 Vul Both ♥ 10 ♦ KQ9732

♣ A932 ♠ KQ10876 ♠ J42 ♥ A932 ♥ K876 ♦ 65 ♦ AJ1084 ♣ J ♣ K ♠ 95 ♥ QJ54 ♦ — ♣ Q1087654

NW E S

A Grade winners: Neville Francis, Kamal Sangumarasa, Ralph Parker and Nathan van Jole

21

T h e Q B A B u l l e t i n J u l y - S e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2

Richard Ward

ORDER NOW!!“Common Bidding Mistakes to Avoid - Guidelines for

Improving Players” by Ross DickPublisher: Queensland Bridge Association Inc

Price: A$24.95 (Free postage and handling within Australia)Orders with payment to: Queensland Bridge Association 22 Mareeba Court, Arana Hills 4054 Phone: 07 3351 8602 Mobile: 0412 064 903 Email: manager@qldbridge.com

Slamming at the Graded Pairs

THE lure of slam bidding can lead to lots of silly results, especially in

pairs where a bottom score is just a bottom score. In teams, a poor slam decision can decide the match.If you were sitting with Therese Tully and me at the Queensland Graded Pairs held at QCBC in early September you would have had heaps of opportunities to make some really dumb decisions.

I was East and the final bid was just a bash. Why can’t partner have an ace? The spotlight was on South (Pele Rankin) who cashed her two aces for one down. Look what happens if she takes her ♦A and exits safely to wait for her ♣A. Slam score: Successes 0; Failures 1Again with no interference we went through a puppet Stayman

Graded Pairs

Dlr W ♠ Q754 Vul EW ♥ 8542 ♦ 1093

♣ 96 ♠ KJ632 ♠ A ♥ Q ♥ AK976 ♦ 64 ♦ KQJ852 ♣ K10752 ♣ 3 ♠ 1098 ♥ J103 ♦ A7 ♣ AQJ84

NW E S

W N E S P P 1D P 1S P 2H P 3NT P 4H P 5D P 6D All pass

sequence. After 3H by North (RW), Therese eschewed keycard and just bashed 6H. Therese is very good at eschewing. The spotlight was on East, who led … a trump. Phew!Slam score: Successes 1; Failures 1 (NB. It’s a success if you make it. Pairs is not for purists!)So, at the end of the first session we had bid two silly slams and lucked out with one of them.

Dlr E ♠ AK7 Vul NS ♥ KQJ102 ♦ QJ7

♣ AK ♠ 10653 ♠ J842 ♥ 83 ♥ 764 ♦ K10985 ♦ A62 ♣ J2 ♣ 763 ♠ Q9 ♥ A95 ♦ 43 ♣ Q109854

NW E S

After the usual 1C-1D-1S start, we found the diamond fit and the singleton heart. No eschewing here. Theresa tried minor-wood and discovered the one key card. It didn’t seem too much of a gamble that North would hold the ♠K. Meanwhile, the word had got round that Therese and Richard were bidding silly slams, so the ♠A hit the table at the speed of light. Damnit!Slam score: Successes 1; Failures 2

Dlr W ♠ QJ106 Vul ♥ Q ♦ KQJ

♣ KQJ95 ♠ A93 ♠ K752 ♥ J1084 ♥ K9765 ♦ 53 ♦ 62 ♣ 8732 ♣ 64 ♠ 84 ♥ A32 ♦ A109874 ♣ A10

NW E S

A Grade winners: Therese Tully and Richard Ward with Toni Bardon and Jim Evans

The modern fashion in cue bids is not to show anything in particular but to cast a rosy glow over the whole auction.

Edgar Kaplan

22

T h e Q B A B u l l e t i n J u l y - S e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2

extremely happy - the local business houses did the Yeppoon Bridge Club proud with sponsorship and donations. A hand very memorable to me was the following.

It was the last board of the day and I saw pass by Ray, pass by East so I could not help myself and bid 1S. West doubled and of course Ray bid 4S, East passed, I passed, West doubled and that's where we played. I felt sick and thought about the excuses I was going to make to our teammates.I got the ♣A lead so I cross-ruffed all the clubs and hearts out making 9 tricks for –200 which was a huge pick-up because our teammates bid the vulnerable 4H without the interference but I have got to say I was feeling quite ill before the dummy hit the table, and saw the lead.This was an excellent congress - certainly recommended. ■

This one needed a bit …..

South (TT) showed a balanced 18-19 hand and North bashed 6NT played by Therese. West led the ♥K which meant that there were 11 sure tricks. After establishing the ♥10, she ran the diamonds which squeezed East in spades and clubs. When a spade was thrown there were 12 tricks. Best defence has East coming down to 4 spades and Qx of clubs. Then there’s a guess. A ‘good slam’ requiring the heart lead and squeeze … .Slam score: Successes 2; Failures 2Then they bid and made a cold slam against us. Therese was cross. Said, ‘Well done’, through gritted teeth.And finally:

After 2 passes the bidding started with a 2C opening by me and a 25+ 3NT rebid. Of course, we had no system after that. Who does? Who cares? So Therese came up with the pragmatic 5D bid (at least I couldn’t confuse it as a transfer!). Blind Freddy could almost count 12 tricks if partner had a Yarborough with 6 diamonds, so the 6D bid was obvious - 13 tricks.Slam score: Successes 3; Failures 2Thankfully it’s not all about slams. The rest of our day was much better! ■

Dlr E ♠ Q93 Vul None ♥ J6 ♦ KQJ9

♣ AJ85 ♠ 104 ♠ J875 ♥ KQ92 ♥ 8743 ♦ 8653 ♦ 10 ♣ 1074 ♣ Q963 ♠ AK62 ♥ A105 ♦ A742 ♣ K2

NW E S

THE weekend of September 1-2 saw Ray and I attending

the inaugural congress. Someone forgot to tell us that there is massive roadworks to Rocky and whereas it should have taken 7-8 hours it in fact took 10-11 hours. The State Member opened the congress and even though we came away with no prize money all visitors were presented with local pineapples to take home, and I was lucky enough to win one of the spot prizes. The raffle was the biggest I have ever seen and it made all winners

Dlr N ♠ A962 Vul Both ♥ — ♦ 6532

♣ 109865 ♠ 10 ♠ K54 ♥ AQJ982 ♥ 643 ♦ KJ4 ♦ AQ ♣ AKJ ♣ Q7432 ♠ QJ873 ♥ K1075 ♦ 10987 ♣ —

NW E S

W N E S P P 1S X 4S P P X All pass

Yeppoon

Dlr S ♠ AKQ8 Vul Both ♥ AQJ ♦ AK6

♣ A84 ♠ J10752 ♠ 63 ♥ K10843 ♥ 7652 ♦ — ♦ 874 ♣ 1053 ♣ KQ62 ♠ 94 ♥ 9 ♦ QJ109532 ♣ J97

NW E S

B Grade winners: David O'Gorman and Julie Jeffries

Les Bonnick (director), Glenda Vincent (YBC treasurer), Denise O'Regan (YBC president), with the winners of the Pairs, Pat Woodward and Kath

Poole (both from Mackay Bridge Club)

Kim Ellaway

T h e Q B A B u l l e t i n J u l y - S e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2

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Caloundra, Capalaba, Carindale, Chermside, Garden City

Helensvale, Hervey Bay, Indooroopilly, Ipswich, Logan Hyperdome,

Mackay, Morayfield, North Lakes, Pacific Fair, Robina

Rockhampton, Springfield, Strathpine, Sunshine Plaza

Townsville (Stocklands & Willows), Tweed City, Victoria Point

Toowoomba (Grand Central & Clifford Gardens), Wynnum

HEAD OFFICE: 41 BULCOCK ST, CALOUNDRA, QLD 4551

PH: 07 54370666 FAX: 07 54370966

EMAIL: admin@cosmeticsplus.com.au

Barbara Tait (Mackay president) with the winners of the Novice Teams: Sally Cox, Gavin and Kathleen Rogers (Major Sponsors from InFocus

Money Management) Janelle Conroy, Eric Leivesley and Janine Rodgers (kneeling)

Coffs Harbour Super Congress

THE Super Congress in Coffs Harbour was a resounding

success. There were 111 Open pairs and 66 Restricted pairs as well as 70/36 teams. Our own Jan Peach and Peter Busch were part of the directing team, and along with brightly dressed and efficient caddies, prompt results and daily bulletins, the event ran smoothly.

What makes Coffs special are the 3 buffet lunches which keep all the players together, mixing and talking. Sandwiches and drinks are served after play on Sunday before the presentation of prizes - Joan Butts being in the winning team. Happy hour started at 5pm every day at the bar - or gatherings happened in the rooms of the Opal Cove Resort where many of the players stayed. I played in the Foster team, team 60, which finished 17th and second in the under 1000MP section. That was Sylvia Foster, Patricia Kull, Kaye Donaldson and Jan Palm.

Kaye Donaldson

Sunnybank teams winners: Michael Sykes, Fred Whitaker, Tony Hutton & Tony Jackman with Sunnybank Secretary - Anne Lovett

SUNNYBANK hosted its Swiss Teams Congress on August 5 this

year. Entries were limited to 30 teams and we had a full house. Jan Peach directed, ensuring a pleasant day for competitors. Sunnybank club members again supplied plentiful amounts of delicious food which was certainly enjoyed by the players - in fact, comments were made by players that the homemade food at Sunnybank Congress was an inducement for them to make sure they entered.It was pleasing to see the Plate won by the team which included father and daughter entrants Paul and Jessica Brake, with Jessica being an ANC Youth member. ■Mackay

Sunnybank

Half the winning Open team: Joan Butts and Paul Wyer

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CluesAcross1. First put down spade, say, made of metal. (4)3. Second strike around shopping centres getting big contract. (5,4)6,14. Emerge successfully - at bridge perhaps. (4,2,6)7. Bridge enthusiast's not the first to say, 'No bid'. (8)9. Commotion at end of trick - feel ruff is mistaken. (9)10. Games in the stationery cupboard. (6)12,11. Very tricky outcome when the opponents don't score. (5,4)16. Results of playing his winning card. (8)17. Run and catch up teammate (7)Down2. Old garment being worn by king and queen of hearts, say. (9)4. A card game with diamonds cut. (8)5,13. Little action in clubs, perhaps. (5,4)8. Only two clubs, maybe, score ten times at Old Trafford. (9)11. Bridge player's hand. Does he make the right lead?15. Chose not to bid spades, after wavering. (6)Solution: Page 26

Brisbane Bridge Centre104 Frederick St, Annerley. Ph: 3392 7933

bbridgecentre@bigpond.com - www.bbc.bridge-club.orgPlay Sessions Tuesday 9.30 am Duplicate 7.30 pm Duplicate Wednesday 10.00 am Duplicate Saturday 1.00 pm DuplicateCoaching Sessions & Monday 9.30 amBeginners’ Classes Tuesday 7.30 pm Friday 10.00 amEnquiries for coaching & beginners’ classes: 3392 7933

ANC Teams' Practice Day

RICHARD Wallis, on behalf of the QBA, hosted a practice day for

the ANC participants finishing up as a social occasion, with spouses asked to join the participants for a light meal and a few drinks. ■

Rose Slater, Toni Bardon, Jim Evans, Andy Slater, Neville Francis, Paul Collins and Richard Wallis

THIS bumper issue is an opportune time to thank all the contributors

to the Bulletin over many years - the stalwarts who send 'stuff' for all or most editions; the occasional contributors and all those in between who send material once or twice a year.Therese has been instrumental in overwhelming me (with material) for the last couple of years by sweet-talking players into writing articles and submitting photos, as well as supplying some of her own.I hope you all continue to help me produce what I hope is a 'good read'.■

From the Editor

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Bridge lessons in CunnamullaTHE bridge community is set to expand into far western Queensland, with beginner classes in Cunnamulla. Classes commenced in Cunnamulla in early July, and have so far attracted twelve enthusiastic students. The classes are supported by the Paroo Shire Council, under the umbrella of Community Development. Teacher Paula Lennon, having recent-ly moved to an isolated property in the Qld/NSW border region south of Cun-namulla, was very keen to get a class going in the south-west, given that the closest bridge club is in Goondiwindi, more than 500km to the east.

Suzette Beresford, Debbie Dunsdan, Paula Lennon and Jane Bourke

FESTIVAL SWISS PAIRS

Sunday Oct 14DIRECTOR: Alan GibsonENTRY FEE: $25 per player Match Point scoring

QUEENSLAND MIXED TEAMS 12 October, 26 October, 9 November on Fridays

7.30pmENTRY FEE: $150 per teamFORMAT: Round Robin or Swiss Movement over 3 sessions depending on number of entries LINE UPS: Both genders must be represented in a team’s line up at all times. DIRECTOR: Alan Gibson

QCBC NOVICE SWISS TEAMS

Sunday Nov 18For players with fewer than 100

masterpoints as at 30/09/12DIRECTOR: Jan Peach SYSTEMS: Blue & Green onlyENTRY FEE: $100 per teamAll enquires and entries to QCBC: 3391 3241 - qcbc1@optusnet.com.au Details on the website: www.qcbc.org.au

Paula has previously introduced many people to the game via classes taught in Warialda through NSW Adult Education, and later, with the help of her keen students, set up an ABF affiliated bridge club in Warialda. “Bridge is a passion for me, and bringing bridge to others is something I ’ ve a lways found ex t remely rewarding. I’d teach just for the joy of it, but happily, I’ve always managed to get paid!” Paula said that the “bush” is under pressure, with increased wages and production costs, the sale of many properties to overseas interests and the subsequent loss of network of “family farms” that previously made

up the community, a lack of a stable workforce from a pull to the mines and the coast, and the subsequent loss of community in many country towns. “Life is tough in the far west, with the workforce that people once relied on gone, many families gone, and with them much of the community life. My dream is that we can one day set up an ABF affiliated club in Cunnamulla, as I believe bridge can bring a new joy to people’s lives, and help build a stronger community!” ■

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Coming EventsOct 6-7 Gold Coast Butler Pairs and Swiss TeamsOct 6 Caloundra Novice PairsOct 6-7 Cleveland Bay TeamsOct 12 QBA Mixed Teams - QCBC - Round 1Oct 13 Mackay TeamsOct 14 Gympie TeamsOct 14 QCBC October Festival PairsOct 20-21 QBA Open and Novice PairsOct 26 QBA Mixed Teams - QCBC - Round 2Oct 27-28 Hervey Bay Butler Pairs and Swiss TeamsOct 27-28 Cleveland Bay Anniversary PairsOct 28 Surfers Paradise Graded TeamsOct 28 Toowoomba Butler PairsNov 3-4 Northern Suburbs PairsNov 3-4 Bowen CongressNov 4 Caloundra TeamsNov 9 QBA Mixed Teams - QCBC - Round 3Nov 10 Townsville Novice TeamsNov 10 QBA Teams of 3Nov 11 QBA Senior Pairs and Youth PairsNov 11 Sunshine Coast Novice PairsNov 14 Cairns Eclipse PairsNov 17-18 Central Qld Teams - MackayNov 17 QBA Congress Directors ExamNov 17-18 Noosa Butler PairsNov 18 QCBC Novice TeamsNov 24-30 Qld Wide PairsNov 25 Toowong Graded TeamsNov 30-Dec 3 GNOT Final Dec 1 Mackay Novice TeamsDec 2 Redlands Graded TeamsDec 9 QBA Individual

If you want items about your club in this section, please send your newsletter or items to Kim Ellaway.

Club News

Gympie After three years Kay Kerr stepped down as president.

Darling DownsThe new president, Barbara Wippell, gave her first report in the newsletter. 21 tables played in their Novice Event - great numbers.

Surfers ParadiseA tribute to Murray Anderson.

Broadwater $6464.00 from the Gambling Fund for a dealing machine.

Bundaberg $6547.00 from the Gambling Fund for IT equipment.

Maryborough$6096.00 from the Gambling Fund for Bridgemates.

Maleny Bridge Club$12,489 from the Gambling Fund for Bridgemates and a dealing machine.

Cairns$4550.00 from the Reef Hotel Casino Benefit Fund for a dealing machine and $6448.00 from the Gambling Fund for Bridgemates.

BBCThe clubrooms have re-opened after the closure to remove asbestos.

Beenleighis up and running and everyone is welcome.

Northern SuburbsKids' Bridge classes - over 25 children attending.

Redcliffeare in their new premises and I was pleased and proud to attend the opening - article in the ABF Bulletin.

The joint winning teams: Top row - Kuldip Bedi, Cassandra Hugonnet (representing BoQ, the sponsor), Suzie Moses, Roger Weathered,

Helen Milward and Robert Milward. Front row - Pele Rankin, Paul Hooykaas and Andy Braithwaite

Surfers Paradise Teams

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NOV 26 (noon)Contributions to:

33 Royal Pde Ashgrove 4060

Ph: 07 3366 1292Email:

psquire@acenet.net.au

D E A D

L I N E

Q B AEmail: manager@qldbridge.comPhone: 07 3351 8602Mobile: 0412 064 903Fax: 07 3103 4799 Web site: www.qldbridge.com

Directors' Corner

LAWS 29-32 about calls out of rotation present some challenges

for directors. The left hand opponent always has the option of accepting a call out of rotation (29A) unless it is an inadmissible double or redouble (32). Before making his decision, LHO should be advised by the director what will happen if he accepts or does not accept the call.An unaccepted bid at LHO’s turn to call (excluding situations where the player has changed a call just made, see Law 25) or at partner’s turn to call means that partner must pass for the rest of the auction. Partner has received information from the offender before his turn to call. Likewise, if not accepted, an admissible double or redouble out of rotation leads to the partner of the offender having to pass at every turn. Laws 23 and 26 may apply in these situations.

Law 87A: A board is considered to be ‘fouled’ if the Director determines that a card (or more than one) was displaced in the board, or if he determines that the dealer or vulnerability differed between copies of the same board, and the contestants who should have had a score comparison did not play the board in identical form for such reason.Suppose a board is played a few times and then the NS cards are placed in the EW pockets and vice versa. This board is now fouled. Not only does the dealer hold different cards than when played earlier but different hands may be vulnerable or not vulnerable. Suppose it is discovered after the session that a board does not match the hand record. Providing every table played the board in the same condition, possibly because it was misdealt, then the board is not considered to be fouled.If the cards are in the correct pockets but the board is turned through 90° when placed on the table then that

board is arrowswitched, not fouled. In pairs events, it is an easy matter to temporarily put the NS pair into the EW field and vice versa so the score may be retained. In teams events it may not be too late to play the board in the arrowswitch position at the other table also.

It can be very distracting to have dummy fiddling with the position of suits in the dummy.If the dummy is placed at least 10 cm in from the edge of the table when first displayed, there is room for the quitted tricks without having to shift the remaining cards. If a suit becomes void, a remaining suit should not be moved into the space.The perennial reminder is that dummy may not pick up a card until that card is named by declarer. Dummy may not indicate that a card should be played or that he expects that a certain card will be played and, yes, that really does include a singleton or a card from among equals.

The QBA Congress D i rec to r Accreditation exam (Paper 2) will be held Saturday, November 17 2012.

Jan Peach

Editing of MaterialContributors should note that the right to modify submitted material is retained by the QBA.

Back: Mary Turner, Jane Seaborne, Lorraine Maltby, Betty Andison, Ellie Sheffield and Lyn Adams - Seated: Alison Brumby, Marlene Nicol,

Betty-Anne Wright. Absent: Janice Wright.

BowenTEN Bowen club members travelled north to compete in the Tully Pairs at Mission Beach. This is more than a quarter of our membership! Our player numbers at club games also increased by about 25% this year during the tourist season, with regular visitors returning for more of our lovely winter weather and bridge hospitality. (And not to be outdone by the Gold Coast, we have a member who is 95 and plays regularly twice a week!)

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