| 47th European Bridge Team Championships | Page 2 | Bulletin 4 - Wednesday, 23 June 2004 |
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No Turkish delight For The Netherlands by Jos Jacobs
For the Dutch, Turkey has developed into one of their favourite countries to spend a holiday. If this will still be the case after this report, remains to be seen, however… The Netherlands, lying eighth after five rounds with 87 VP, were scheduled to play Turkey in Round 6, the latter being ranked second with 101 VP. Right from the start of these Championships, Turkey had been performing impressively well, so the Dutch knew they had to be careful. After Turkey had scored a few IMPs on superior partscore bidding, the score stood at 7-1 to them when, on Board 8, active bidding by Zorlu and Assael saw them end up in a fair game to which their Dutch counterparts came nowhere near:
Zorlu’s active bidding still netted 3 IMPs as this was what happened in the Open Room:
On a diamond lead the defenders can take the first seven tricks but, on a more normal heart lead, it’s declarer who will rattle off the first eight for his contract. Thus it turned out after Verhees’ lead of the ©10; Turkey 2 IMPs more to lead 9-1. Board 10 very much looked like a flat 3NT, but watch out:
After the auction above, Zorlu had to find a lead. Within a split second he elected to lead his best short suit: clubs. The §6 was ducked in dummy, East won the jack and, after a long thought, returned the suit to dummy’s now bare ace on which Zorlu of course unblocked his king. Muller cashed the ¨A next, getting the bad news. He then switched to hearts but when East could not be kept off the lead the contract stood no chance. That was 13 IMPs for Turkey as this is what happened at the other table:
Who can blame Jan Jansma for not finding the same devastating club lead on this unrevealing auction? A spade lead went to the ace, the ¨10 was covered by the queen and ace and a low diamond then established the suit with the help of a later finesse; eleven easy enough tricks. On the next board, the Dutch defenders should have beaten Zorlu’s contract by two tricks when declarer elected to follow a line of play in anticipation of a bad trump break that did not exist in real life:
De Wijs led a diamond against 3§. Had Zorlu dared to win dummy’s
queen, discard a spade on the ©A and lead a club to the king, there
would have been no story to tell as he simply would have lost two
clubs, a diamond and a spade to land his contract. At the table,
however, he ran the diamond lead to his hand, played a diamond to
the queen, shed a spade on the ©A and took the diamond finesse.
De Wijs, North, ruffed this and returned the ©K to put declarer
in his hand. Zorlu ruffed and played his last diamond, again ruffed
by North. At this point, De Wijs has to make a decision: if partner
holds ªAQ he has to exit with a trump to force declarer to lead
spades from his hand in the ending. If, on the other hand, declarer
holds the ªA, South is bound to have two or three trump tricks,
in which case spades is the right suit in which to exit. As West
had bid and rebid clubs, though the 3§ bid might well have been
a choice of the lesser evil, De Wijs elected to exit in trumps,
throwing away an extra undertrick.
This contract went down two, due to the bad trump split. The Dutch suffered a heavy blow when De Wijs/Muller ended up in an unmakeable 4© whereas Atabey and Kolata reached the ice-cold 3NT. To make things worse, N/S were vulnerable too:
After his partner’s club lead to the ace Zorlu cashed the ¨AK and returned a club. De Wijs ruffed and Assael gave him a glitter of hope by contributing the ten, suggesting an original holding of Q106 in the suit. De Wijs ruffed, crossed in trumps, ruffed another club (no success) and played off all his remaining trumps, on which he had to discard a spade from dummy. Next came the two diamonds, on which East had to blank his ªJ. To the penultimate trick, dummy led the ªQ. When Zorlu did not cover this, Assael’s §Q became the setting trick; Turkey +100.
A very well-controlled auction saw Atabey and Kolata reach the
correct contract almost effortlessly. With the score at 39-6 the Turkish put the final nail into the Dutch coffin:
On this hand, the E/W pairs here in Malmö were divided into two groups of about equal size: those who would pass 3NT and thus finish up in the proper contract and those who preferred to rebid their not too good spade suit a third time to reach 4ª. In the Closed Room, the Turks belonged to the former section (following the example set by their teammates on Board 12) and De Wijs led the ¨9. Muller overtook this with the ten and declarer ducked. Next came the ¨A and another, declarer winning the king. Then came the §Q, the ªA, two top clubs and the three top hearts, declarer ending in his hand. To finish it off in great style, Zorlu exited with his last heart and finessed the ªJ on North’s forced spade return; nicely played and +430 to Turkey.
In the Open Room, Louk Verhees was in 4ª and he got the lead of the ©4. He won the king and cashed the ªA. He then went back to his hand in clubs and continued the ªK, discarding a diamond in dummy and getting the news. He then played a diamond, won by Kolata with his ace. At this point, if Kolata returns a diamond, Atabey will ruff and come to two more trump tricks later, but Kotala exited with his second heart instead. Now, had Verhees won North’s eight with the ace, all would have been well as dummy can be reached with the ©Q to dispose of the remaining diamonds on the top clubs. After this, declarer can ruff dummy’s last heart for his ninth trick and exit in trumps, after which he will come to another trump trick for his contract. At the table, however, Verhees won the heart return with dummy’s queen. His plan was to throw the ©K and a diamond on the clubs, cash the ¨K, ruff a heart and go for the trump endplay. This plan failed when Atabey could ruff the ¨K after all and sit back now for his two remaining trump tricks to come in; Turkey +50 and 10 more IMPs to lead 49-6. Finally, on the next board, a good chance for the Dutch to recoup some points:
In the Closed Room, De Wijs was able to double 1NT for penalties and Muller took the right decision by passing. After five rounds of clubs De Wijs had to find an exit card. Muller had thrown the ¨4 followed by the ª3, ª8 and ª9. Declarer had discarded the ª4, ©2 and the ¨5. After some thought, De Wijs went for the wrong red suit: ©Q. Zorlu did not hesitate for a moment, won the king in dummy and finessed for South’s ©J. that was contract made for +180 to Turkey, but one feels there should have been a way to find the correct switch to diamonds.
In the Open Room, Kolata retreated into 2¨ after partner’s double and went three down vulnerable; Netherlands +300 and 3 IMPs to them. It might have been a 9-IMP swing, however. At the post, Turkey had won by 49-10 IMPs which converted to 23-7 in VPs. Turkey would stay firmly in second place but The Netherlands took an enormous splash. Not into beautiful seas around Turkey but down to 14th position. |
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