| 45th GENERALI European Bridge Championships, Arona, Tenerife, Canary Islands | Monday, 18 June 2001 |
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Denmark v. Iceland At this year´s Europeans, the first of the many Nordic battles was scheduled on top of the first-round draw. As a consequence, nobody looking at the programme even superficially could possibly overlook it., so here is a report on what happened. Denmark won 43-26 or 19-11 in V.P., mainly thanks to one big grand slam swing. The match started off in real traditional Nordic fashion, however, with the weak NT running into all sorts of trouble:
2§ was explained as showing clubs and diamonds, so North retreated into what she thought was an eight-card fit at least. It turned out that she was wrong here, but the defenders had to find out too what was really going on. Now if the defence leads trumps declarer will be happy to scramble five tricks, but at the table, a heart was led to the king and ace. Dorthe Schaltz returned a heart to the eight, nine and ten. Now if the defenders lead trumps all will still be well for them, but when West first tried his singleton club, the tide had turned. Schaltz won the ace and played another heart. This time, East ruffed in front of dummy with the ¨A and returned the ¨ 7. West could win and return a trump, but declarer had seven tricks and Iceland had scored only 100.
Same opening, same double, same rescue action and same explanation! When West did not show too much interest in defence, EW soon were committed to a shaky 3NT. South led a club to North´s ace and the ¨J came back. West won and four rounds of spades were cashed, North throwing a heart and a club. Declarer now led a heart to his queen and played a low club, felling the now bare ace. The squeeze had worked; nine tricks, 400 and the first 7 IMP´s to Denmark. Board 2 was flat:: a save in 4ª against a vulnerable 4© that could not be made due to lack of entries to dummy. The came a matter of self-restraint::
No chance, two down. Iceland +100. But:
Ten tricks, Iceland *130 and 6 IMP´s back for staying at a safe level. Another chance for either side came by on
board 6:
When Baldursson led the ¨A and another, there was nothing Dorthe Schaltz could do. She played a trump, but Baldursson rose with the ace, led a club to partner´s ace and got his ruff. Iceland +50.
With 1NT showing 14-16 hcp., this looks like an underbid, but successful this time. Iceland +170 and 6 IMP´s.
2ª was invitational or better in diamonds, the double of 3ª showed a fair hand. 4NT was RKC and 5¨ showed 0/3. 5NT asked for kings and 6§ showed one. Maybe, 7§ was an offer for an alternative grand slam, but North saw no reason to accept, so 7¨ became the final contract. Trumps were led; declarer then drew the last trump, cashed the clubs and ruffed the last club. On the run of the diamonds both defenders then decided to discard all the spades, though Baldursson had shown count by making the ª6 his first discard. Thus, though there was no squeeze at all it very much looked like it…Denmark +2140. Was it necessary?
Something must have gone wrong here…Iceland only 690 and a loss of 16 IMP´s. Had Denmark been in the proper slam they would have scored 1370 and still gained 12 IMP´s. On board 12, Iceland missed a nice defence,
but it did not cost very much:
Holding ¨Kx, North could not be sure that reopening would hit the jackpot with this one-sided hand. The contract quietly went down two, Denmark +100.
Here, North led the ©A. Now, if he switches to a low diamond, South can win and lead the ©10, pinning the nine and paving the way for a three-trick set. The pedestrian defence also works here: three top hearts, watch partner´s discards and then play ¨K and another. Only down one in that event, so a possible 2-IMP gain turned into a 2-IMP loss. On board 15, a two-suited overcall went out of control when the overcaller in fact had nothing but the suit he mentioned:
Playing with screens, the chance of any unauthorised information due to the failure to alert reaching the other side of the screen is not very great, so there seems little wrong with the way the final contract was reached except for the system error. Down three, Denmark +500.
The double was negative of course, and the conversion to 3NT the only way out. On the actual layout declarer went down four, but that was a very good save when he found out that 4© was on for the other side. Still, Iceland +200. As it happened, neither NS pair had come anywhere near reaching 4©, but 7 IMP´s went to Denmark again, the last swing of the match.
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