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The 2022 Bay Pairs Report
TE PUKE AND FINAL BAY OF PLENTY PAIRS REPORT - 19 June 2022
The final round of the 2022 Bay of Plenty Pairs Competition was held in Te Puke with another twelve tables competing. A big thank you goes to all players who came along, whether they were in the running or not. Congratulations to the winners.
The overall Competition winners were:
First - Jenna and Christine Gibbons, Te Puke
Second - Kate Terry and Judy Pawson, Tauranga
Third - Bren Birss and Graham Stern, Mt Maunganui
Click here to view the final ladder for the 2022 Bay Pairs.
Best Intermediate Player Cup – Bren Birss, Mt Maunganui
Best Junior Player(s) Cup – Deidre Gunn and Jackie Blue, Tauranga who were partners for the event.
(In case you are wondering about the above wording, Bren is an Intermediate, whereas Graham is an open player. The best Intermediate and Junior cups are awarded to players in those categories, regardless of the status level of their partners. This is to encourage more players, other than just open to come and enjoy this round of events.) A full list of placings is attached.
Competitive bidding and hand evaluation come together in the following hand from the afternoon session. North is the dealer and N/S Vulnerable.
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K94
AKQ3
7632
J5North will open 1NT if they are playing the Weak No Trump, while East may not feel they can overcall at this stage. South should take this out to 2H (either by a weak 2H bid or a 2D transfer depending on system) because of the singleton Spade. Some adventurous Wests will bid 2S competitively and North will have no trouble bidding 3H. 4 hearts headed by AKQ is not to be wasted. Now East can re-evaluate his hand with the singleton heart and 6-4 distribution and show partner his support with 3S. South’s hand has now become much better with his singleton in the opposition’s suit and a good 5 card D suit on the side, and will bid 4H. Most Wests will take out insurance in case the 4H is making and bid 4S. They can be confident that holding 3 little hearts themselves, that partner probably only has 1, or at most 2.
Should N/S be playing Standard American or some other strong NT system they will open 1D and most Easts will put in a 2C bid with their 6 card suit. Now South has a harder decision as to whether to support the D or show the rather weak H suit. Not having any Spades removes the negative double option in my book. Jenna and I play that West can now show the 5 card spade suit at the 2 level, while being prepared for partner to rebid their C if they do not like S. It is not a game force bid to us, just trying to find the best pairs contract. And once again the auction will become quite competitive with N/S able to bid their D or H suits and E/W their S or C suits. N/S can make 4H with the K of diamonds onside, losing only 1 spade and two clubs. E/W needs to sacrifice as they are not vulnerable and will only be 1 light in 4S.
Wouldn’t it be a boring hand if no-one evaluated their hand, not just counted their points, and it just went 1NT by North, 2H weak by South. East and West would both be bemoaning the fact in the post-mortem that they did not have enough points to overcall with East only have 9 and West not liking their relatively flat 10. And they will also be losing all the matchpoints, even if the opposition die in 2H.
Happy Bridging, Christine
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MOUNT MAUNGANUI BAY OF PLENTY PAIRS REPORT - 29 May 2022
It was pleasing to see twelve tables of bridge players turn up for this event. Norm Silcock was the director again, and also took on the role of scorer. The event had a happy atmosphere and I would again urge local club players to come along and enjoy an open tournament which encompasses a variety of playing abilities in what I hope will always be low key and friendly environment.
The board I have chosen to highlight shows the complexity and uncertainty of bridge which keeps us on our toes and provides the stories for afterwards.
Dealer West Nil Vul
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Instructional Value of this hand
- Health Warning. If you open as West, never pass out partner in a NT contract
- If you open as West, It may be preferable that your partner never gets to see your hand.
Immediate internal dialogue by all 4 players on looking at their hands:
West. It’s my opening bid. I don’t want it. How good is partner’s mood at the moment.
(In my own peculiar way, I like this hand, but everything is either an underbid or an overbid – Ed.)
North. If West opens what strength are our jump overcalls.
East. Good, I have the best hand at the table. No problems here
South. Lots of Diamonds, but let’s see if anyone cares.
All. Whose hand is it anyway? Who’s bidding to make and who is sacrificing? Who should be doubling? What’s partner’s tolerance level like if I should really mess this up?
Bidding – now this is the interesting bit.
West: May be able to open 2S, a weak two suited hand with spades and another.
May be able to open a weak single 6 card spade bid, either by 2D multi or 2S weak.
May have a lot of self-control and Pass, because of weakness in points and lack of honours in S. (This was impossible for the writer, who opened 2D showing a 6 card major, and it still felt like an underbid)
North now has to choose what level of Hearts to bid, with long H and light points to overcall. 2H is a great overcall if it is available, and 3H is a good pre-emptive opening, but an aggressive overcall
East has it easy and should bid 4S
South has a lot of responsibility for the final result. Looking at the results – from worst to best for N/S.
- One doubled 4S (making 7 for 890 to E/W)
- 2 Souths bid 5H, for -50 and -100 . A very good sacrifice
- One South bid 5D, doubled, not as good a sacrifice as being in H
- 5 tables bid to 5S by E/W, making 7, for the top E/W scores
- One lucky N/S got to play in 4H making for the top N/S score
I cannot recommend any sensible way for E/W to bid the 6S slam, as N will always open the bidding before East, but maybe they could be pushed there with some kamikaze bidding by West
Riet Jansen and Julie Downs from the Mount took out the best non-open pair prize. The rest of the results may be seen here
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TAURANGA BAY OF PLENTY PAIRS REPORT
Round 2 of the Bay Pairs Events was held in Tauranga on Sunday 22 May with 9 Tables. This was a face to face event, with masks being optional, and the room seemed to be evenly split between those wearing and not wearing masks.
Norm Silcock was directing and the first session was 27 Boards, 3 boards a table, Mitchell movement (straight around the room) with Norm having seeded the players. In the afternoon I was most impressed with the “Interwoven Howell” movement he found and got Bob Fearn to write the movement into the Compass scoring program prior to the event. It was a Howell movement with all players changing tables and or directions each 3 board movement, but in doing so each N/S Pair from the morning session played all the E/W pairs from the morning session, plus only one pair they had played in the morning, thereby playing all the room. It worked the same way for the E/W players playing all the N/S morning pairs plus one pair again. Each pair was given their own guide cards for the movements and boards to be played each round. It went off without a hitch.
The two hands I have chosen to comment on show the difference that can be caused by system decisions.
Board 3 Dealer S EW Vul
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South is the dealer, with E/W vulnerable. First system issue is whether you open 11 point hands, and this one is at the strong end of 11 points. If you do, West does not have a take out Double, even with 14 Points, and North will bid Spades and N/S will be hard put to stop short of game, which doesn’t make in any strain be it No Trumps, Spades or Hearts. If South passes, then E/W comes into the bidding with a lot of Wests opening a perfectly reasonable 1NT. If North does not overcall, East will not like this position and will try a weak Stayman, bidding 2C and then either passing the 2D negative response, or going 2H, pick a major if it is in their arsenal. (Which unfortunately it was in our case), on the basis that any 4-3 major fit is going to be better than 1NT. However on this layout 2S has no play, North thinks it is his birthday and collects -200 for a top. The other range of contracts on this horror hand were all N/S starting with 4HX 2 down, 3NT 2 down, 3NT 1 Down, 3C making once, and going one down, 3S played by North twice making, with 2S by North also making 3.
The next hand was at the other end of the scale being very rewarding to bid and play.
Board 15 Dealer S NS Vul
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South is the dealer and N/S are vulnerable. After South passes, E/W found their lovely H fit at all tables. 3 Pairs stopped in 4 Hearts, 5 pairs reached 6H, and one pair was able to cue to the optimal 7H contract. All except one pair also make 7H. With West having opened whatever their system dictates, probably 1C or 1NT, and East shown their Hearts, and being supported by West, East should take control. The singleton Club brings their hand to look like 19 points opposite an opener. This can be done by bidding a splinter in Clubs, or cueing a Diamond, or ace asking with Gerber or Blackwood, or Roman keycard, whatever their system choice is. Cue bidding has the advantage for more experienced players in that you can identify that the missing King is a Club, which is vital so that you do not have to take any finesses and makes bidding 7 easier.
The ladder to date is to be found on this site.
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WHAKATANE BAY OF PLENTY PAIRS REPORT
Held on the 27 March, the Whakatane Club had a very difficult decision to make regarding whether to hold this event as a face-to-face event with masks, and the probability that not many players would travel in the then current Covid situation, or hold it on-line, which would stop most of their local players playing, who are unfamiliar with playing on a computer.
They opted to go on-line and spent extra effort to facilitate this with the help of Tauranga members who were already running Realbridge Sessions, and Kevin Hu from Auckland as director/realbridge operator.
It was disappointing that only 16 pairs entered, but there was at least one other large on-line tournament on that weekend, and the Waikato Area Pairs on-line event for the same day was cancelled because of lack of entries.
Congratulations to all who entered and to the Prize Winners. The results are posted on the Waikato-Bays site - scroll back to 27-March. The overall ladder is available by clicking here.
A special congratulations to Deidre Gunn and Jackie Blue as the top Junior/Junior pair.
A couple of interesting hands demonstrated the power of distribution.
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Four E/W pairs played 4H making 6H, due to the fortuitous singleton QC, while four N/S pairs played in 2 or 3 spades. West will open 1H, and be discouraged by a 1NT or 2H bid by their partner. A 2S bid by South should encourage West to Bid 3H because of their shape, which will help propel the auction to 4H, especially as South will not be able to resist a 3S bid on their shape. However if E/W get to 4H, they should not double on their 17 count as their hand does not have enough quick tricks and the deal is obviously distributional. A 4S sacrifice bid is only one away, and is a better option.
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North is the dealer and Vulnerable. North can only make 2S, because of the D ruff, whereas E/W, with less HCP can make 3H because of better distribution. But N/S can stop this by opening the North hand a weak 6 card major, thereby neutering the East hand from being able to bid, and West does not have enough points to justify coming in at the 3 level. The only fly in the ointment will be the evaluation of the South hand which is very close to being able to invite, but not quite, with no ruffing power. But we all know that there will be those bidders who will invite and then N will be too high, whether they accept and go 4S or die in 3S. A diamond is the obvious lead from both East and West, leading to a ruff in the West hand.
The next round of the Bay Pairs is on the 22 May in Tauranga. See you there.
Christine Gibbons
