| 47th European Bridge Team Championships | Page 2 | Bulletin 12 - Friday, 2 July 2004 |
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Bulgaria v Netherlands – Open Round 26 by Jos Jacobs The evening match on Wednesday’s vugraph screen was the Bulgaria v Netherlands encounter. Bulgaria’s new team here in Malmö have not done as well as they might have been hoping for, taking into account the reputation their national squad has built up for themselves over the last decade or so. On the other hand, the Netherlands badly needed every single VP they could get, as they are fighting it out with England and Turkey for the fifth ticket to Estoril. From the technical point of view, a good and spectacular match was in sight, as both sides are feared for the unexpected things, either good or bad, they are able to conjure up at the table. The match started exactly as the audience had hoped:
In the Closed Room, De Wijs’ 4ª sounded convincingly enough to induce Karakolev to show his second suit by bidding 4NT. This time, the Bulgarian super-aggressive style did not come off, as 4ª would have had no play at all. When 5§ went two off, the Netherlands had conjured up +300 from almost nothing. Well done, just the start they wanted most.
Jansma’s 2NT worked out very well, as it suggested defensive values. Verhees wisely did not stick his neck out any further over 4ª and the Dutch collected +50 here for 8 IMPs to open their account. On the next board, both teams missed a chance:
As trumps are 2-2, the contract will be made easily on a ruffing finesse against the §J. Only the continuation of the §A and another for North to ruff beats the contract. We leave it to you to work out if South can find this line of defence. What card should North play at trick one to steer his partner in the right direction? On vugraph, both Souths continued spades at trick two for no swing. The Dutch picked up three more IMPs on overtricks on the next six boards to lead 11-0 when we saw this:
East made a light take-out double here, which should have seen them into the safe haven of 3NT very quickly. When West bid 2ª, rather than stressing his solid spade stopper straight away, the Bulgarians ran into trouble, as East’s 3ª was a good description of his distribution, but maybe not of the strength of his hand. As it happens, 5¨ can be made if declarer plays very carefully. Simon de Wijs made the fine lead of the ©A and switched to the ¨Q. Declarer won and ruffed a heart in dummy, ruffed a spade in hand and ruffed another heart with dummy’s ¨10. As this gave South two trump tricks, the contract had to go one down now. In fact, declarer was playing for a 3-2 break in trumps, which would have seen him through easily enough on this line. But what about this variation? ©A, ¨A, heart ruff, ªA, spade ruff, heart ruff, three rounds of clubs. This is the position:
With eight tricks already in the bag, declarer cashes the ©J, South having to follow suit, and then will lead the thirteenth club, scoring the ¨10 en passant for his tenth trick. The ¨A will then be the game-going trick. Contract made, but not on vugraph this time; The Netherlands a lucky +100.
As Barry Rigal, our vugraph commentator, put it, ‘Jansma made the agricultural bid of 3NT in response to his partner’s take-out double’. Of course, this expression usually has a slightly negative connotation, but certainly not this time, as Jansma had nine easy enough tricks on the lead of the ªJ when the clubs split 3-3. Netherlands had another +600 and 12 more IMPs to lead 23-0. On the next board, Bulgaria struck back to finally get off the mark:
4NT showed a two-suiter, but West was happy to revert to clubs. South led the ªK. Dummy won and, with nothing to guide him, declarer ruffed a spade in hand and then cashed the §A, getting the bad news. A heart was won by dummy’s king and the club finesse taken. As declarer could not avoid the loss of two diamonds he had to go one down; Netherlands +100.
Verhees also showed his two-suiter, but in natural style. North found a double that might have given Verhees a clue to the winning line. South led the ©A and switched to the ªK. If you win and play a trump to the ten, you are home. You draw trumps and play a diamond to the nine. Later, you can use dummy’s only entry, the ©K, to play the ¨J, picking up the suit; eleven tricks. Once Verhees played a trump to the ace at trick three, there was no way to recover. He even went two down when he used dummy’s only entry to lead the ¨J (hoping for something to happen in the suit) instead of taking the trump finesse. So that was a sweet +500 to Bulgaria and 9 IMPs. Board 11 was another push, but then we saw a triplet of lively boards:
South led the ¨3, ruffed by declarer. Two top trumps and three rounds of hearts left declarer in dummy. Double dummy, it was easy to see the impending show-up squeeze in the minors against North, certainly if declarer would have postponed the second round of trumps till this moment, to have an easy access back to his hand. As Karakolev had forgotten this, he was now in an awkward position as he would still have to give up a trump trick to rectify the count. So the best thing declarer could do now was to try and guess the §Q immediately. A sigh of relief came from the many Dutchmen in the Vugraph theatre when Karakolev played a club to his king…one down; Netherlands +50. Had he been able to draw the second top trump after setting up the hearts, declarer could have given South his trump trick, ruffed the diamond return with the last trump and cashed the hearts. North will have to fold his cards in the resulting three-card ending.
1© showed spades but the Dutch were never tempted. +480 here made it another 11 IMPs for them. But then:
A matchpoint double maybe, by De Wijs, but it would have been a great success had they defended the hand correctly. De Wijs led a spade to Muller’s jack and a trump came back, which looked like an error. North won the queen and led a low club which ran to declarer’s jack. A low diamond was won by North’s king (ducking it would have been better) and declarer next cashed the §A. When the queen dropped he could cross to the ©A, draw trumps and enjoy the clubs for an overtrick; Bulgaria +380. Both continuing spades, shortening declarer’s trumps, and attacking the clubs, would have been better for the defence. After a second round of clubs North will obtain a ruff in the suit, killing dummy in the process, and declarer will not be able to escape going down at least one.
As this contract could not be made either, the Netherlands lost another 200 here, giving Bulgaria a swing of 11 IMPs. Bulgaria trailed by 20-34 now. And more:
On a heart lead, North won the ace and returned the two. Declarer’s jack went to South’s queen and South, a little surprisingly, shifted to the ¨4. North won the ace and played yet another heart, which declarer took with his king. He next played a club to the queen which held, followed by a diamond to the jack and queen. South cashed his heart and exited with a club, but declarer rose with the ace and cashed out in diamonds, the ªA being his seventh trick; Bulgaria +90.
For once, but not for the last time on Wednesday evening (as it turned out later), Orange ran out of fuel. Verhees managed to collect six tricks for a further loss of 200 to his team, or 7 more IMPs to Bulgaria. The score was 34-27 now, and on the Board 18, Bulgaria finally scored the equalizer. With two boards to go the score stood at 35 all but this was the penultimate board:
2§ showed, among other possibilities, a weak two in diamonds, but it also kept West out of the bidding for one round. It is difficult to understand West’s way of bidding the hand. First of all, 4© looks like an underbid, but when East nevertheless went on to cuebid in both spades and diamonds, what more did West need? Anyway, that was Bulgaria +680.
2NT was a minor-suit pre-empt, but once Jansma overcalled 3§ reaching slam had become inevitable for the Dutch. Right they were, as there was little in the play once diamonds could not be successfully attacked at trick one; Netherlands +1430 for a swing of 13 IMPs. A further overtrick on the last board made it 49-35 or 18-12 VPs to the Netherlands. |
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