This event took place on May 10th in brilliant sunshine.  106 pairs played seven 7-board matches.  Directors Eddie and Kathy Williams worked extremely hard to keep everything going and the waiting time between matches down to a minimum.  David Galpin assisted them for the first few matches.

The winners were Dave Franklin and Gerry Stanford (pictured with SCCBA chairman Jackie Clinton) who finished 15 VPs ahead of Pyers Pennant and Ian Hesslewood.  David Nastaszczuk and Philip Hunt were 3rd.  The Non-Expert prize was won by ............

The Kremer Dersch Trophy, which is competed for by committee members of Sussex clubs, has been won by the team representing Eastbourne Bridge Club.  The Eastbourne team (pictured after being presented with the trophy by SCCBA Chairman Jackie Clinton) consisted of Winnie Perry, Ann Hall, Hugh Ball and John Tostdevine.

Eastbourne finished just 2 IMPs ahead of Lewes (Richard Burnett, Mike Keeping, Janet Cattermole and Di Johnstone).  Bexhill (Brian Gould, Anita Cullen, Trevor Graham and Barbara Graham) were third.

14 teams, including 2 from the SCCBA committee, competed in the event which was well organised by SCCBA Secretary Julia Simpson.  SCCBA committee members David and Andea Galpin voluntarily gave up their afternoon to direct the event and an excellent tea was provided by the Eastbourne club.

This year’s Gladys Hakki award has gone to Phyl White of Eastbourne Bridge Club.  Phyl is pictured receiving the award from SCCBA Chairman Jackie Clinton at the Spring Congress at Uckfield.

Phyl was a founder member (with Bertie Wallace and Stella Furlonger among others) of the Eastbourne Bridge Club.  During 20 years of development, she has served on the committee in most capacities, including secretary and president, in recognition of which she was made a Life Member.  She has also taught bridge for many years (and continues to teach), both at the club and at her home, partly with the aim of encouraging lesser players and making them feel wanted.

At age 94, Phyl won the Sussex County Ladies Pairs Trophy for the fifth time – twice with Joyce Rowbotham, once with her pupil Sandy Blunt, and twice with Marion Hart.  She has also won the Sussex Mixed Pairs trophy twice, both times with Richard Coombs. Now aged 99, she is still playing several times a week at the club and recently came second in the Lynne Armstrong Memorial trophy.

A fuller version of this biography of Phyl by Pyers Pennant will appear in the next Sussex Newsletter.

A busy Spring Congress was held at Uckfield between April 18th and 20th.  Not only was Eddie Williams an excellent organiser but he directed for the whole weekend, ably assisted by his wife Kathy and Tournament Manager Norman Hardy.

The final event was the Swiss Pairs which was won by Mick Carrington, Richard Fedrick, Dave Franklin and Gerry Stanford (pictured left).  Other winners were ........

.......... Dave Franklin and Martin Pool (pictured with Jackie Clinton) who won the Multiple Teams with Nigel Osmer and Mick Carrington.

The Basic Bridge Pairs was won by Avril Strong and Jill Tickner.

The Welcome Pairs (well organised by Sally Bugden) for players who are new to the game was won by Lilian Brodbin and Diana Kay.  An enjoyable time was had by all.

After several heats around the County, the Mixed Pairs Final was held at West Sussex Bridge club in Cuckfield on Sunday 13th April.  22 pairs qualified for the final in which there were three rounds of 14 boards, played so that everyone played each other.  After the first 14 boards, Dave and Jill Armstrong were in the lead.  Philip Hunt and Carol Watson took over the lead after 28 boards but Dave Clifton and Chris Jepson stormed through on the last 14 boards to win by 4.76%.   Dave and Jill Armstrong were second and Mike Keeping and Janet Cattermole were third.

Many thanks go to David Galpin for directing the afternoon and to May Langmaid for organising an excellent tea and the whole competition.

102 pairs entered this, the county’s premier pairs competition, and played in heats at eight local clubs.  48 pairs went forward to semi-finals at Avenue, Eastbourne and Worthing.  22 pairs contested an all-play-all final held on April 6th at West Sussex bridge club and directed by Norman Hardy.  The winners, with 61%, were Matthew Hoskins and Andrew Southwell.  David and Andrea Galpin were second and Chris Bainham and Eddie Lucioni third.

The hand below is a modest part-score one that helped the winners on their way.

East’s two No Trump bid was alerted and explained as showing the minors. That’s a neat gadget! After West’s re-opening double, East had a problem. With no support for his partner’s suit, he was nervous about bidding a new suit at the three level, for fear of finding partner’s shortage. The conventional two No Trump bid solved the problem nicely. West was able to bid three Diamonds, his better minor, and the optimum contract, which is otherwise difficult to reach. Hoskins/Southwell got a complete top on the board (against us!), a small nudge on their way to overall victory.

The top four pairs will go on to represent Sussex in the Corwen Cup (in which the Hoskins/Southwell partnership came second last year) on May 31st/June 1st. Wish them luck!

Pyers Pennant (Organiser)

The Sussex teams for this year's Metropolitan Cup on May 18th have been selected.   With names in no particular order, they are :-

A Team

Julian Mitchell (Captain) and Peter Clinch
Richard Burnett and Mike Keeping
Dave Clifton and Chris Jepson
Matthew Hoskins and Andrew Southwell
Ian and Liz Lancaster
Malcolm and Karen Pryor

B Team

C1 Team

Norman Hardy (Captain) and Tim Greenhill
Andrea Galpin and Malcolm Wright
Philip Hunt and Yves Lebrec
Leon Northeast and John Jackson

C2 Team

The Event has now been scored county-wide.  The winners were Gerry Stanford and Dave Franklin from the Horsham Heat.

The over-70 winners were Bill Adams and Bertie Wallace from the Eastbourne Heat and the over-80 winners were Di Jennings and Vera Redman from the West Sussex Heat.

Congratulations to Mike Butler on winning the Sussex Individual Final at Worthing, albeit very narrowly over James Watson-Saunders.  Beryl Pitman was 3rd.

Congratulations to winners Rick Stevens and Alex Harding (pictured left).  Many thanks to organiser and scorer Norman Hardy for resolving the problems caused by there being two fouled boards.  This event, which took place in the week beginning January 14th, involved 11 heats and 194 pairs.  It raised over £1,000 which will be shared between Sussex Air Ambulance and the Knowles Tooth Children’s Centre at Hurstpierpoint.

A very friendly but competitive atmosphere helped this event to be extremely enjoyable.  Director Norman Hardy gave encouragement to all those who had not used Bridgemates before to become confident in their use.  Most players agreed that Bridgemates were not as scary as they had thought they might be and even admitted that their use ensured the day ran very smoothly.

58 pairs attended and enjoyed a fantastic lunch which was supplied, as usual, by John Porteous.  Andy Morris rounded off the afternoon with his expert commentary on the hands.  The East/West winners were Valerie and David Barofka (pictured left) and the North/South winners were Reg Underwood and Julia Raymond.

Runners-up were John Wrapson and Liz Beeston (North/South) and Bill Hensby and David Harris (East West).  The other winners were ..........

......... Ann Binder and Frances Wallace (pictured left) who won the Non-Expert award.

Congratulations to all.

It was a worrying time at Christmas when there were only 25 teams but, thanks to the latecomers, we had 40 teams in all and the day went very well. There were some excellent hands to play and the directors were fantastic. We actually finished very early at 8.30 p.m., all due to David Galpin, Eddie Williams and John Taylor. The buffet, as always, was brilliant with hot and cold food to suit every taste and we thank John Porteous for the outstanding spread that he gave us.

It was an excellent result for Gerry Stanford, Dave Franklin, Richard Fedrick and Mick Carrington (pictured left) who have pulled off the double and won two years in succession. Are they going for the hat-trick next year?

In 2nd place were......

..... John Murrell, Magnus Berger, Eddie Lucioni and Chris Bainham, (pictured left with SCCBA Vice-Chairman Eddie Williams).

In 3rd place were Joy Mayall, Andrew Willard, David Spencer and Peter Brown and in 4th place were Roy Skelton, Valerie Benson, Rosemary Churchill and Roger Pyart.

The Non-Expert prize was won by Margaret Drake, Shirley Robinson, Hazel Beveridge and Lorraine Baker.

The heats of the David Pavey Trophy have now been completed.  To see details of qualifiers for the final on February 16th at Worthing Bridge Club, select ‘Calendar’ from the Contents list and then select the final event itself.  If you have qualified for the final and are unable to play or if you have any questions, please contact the organiser Valerie Chandler immediately.

Please note that the Worthing heat of the Mixed Pairs as been re-instated and will be held on Tuesday January 29th, 2008 at 19:30. 

Please note also that the date for the final has been moved to Sunday April 13th, 2008, to avoid a clash with the Portland Pairs.

The Hills Trophy is an open teams event and took place on 18^th November.  There were 6 matches altogether and tea and supper were provided.  Two married pairs were the eventual winners.

1^st           Joan and Geoff Kellet with Margaret and Ron Buddery

2^nd          Roy Skelton, Rosemary Churchill, Valerie Benson and Muriel Bailey

3^rd           Andrea and David Blaine with Joan and Bernie Hootman

The heats of the Sussex Pairs have now been completed.  To see details of qualifiers for the three semi-finals, select either ‘Pairs Competitions’ or ‘Calendar’ from the Contents list and navigate through to either of the ‘Sussex Pairs’ semi-final events.  If you have qualified for a semi-final and cannot make the allocated date or will not be available to play in the final (on April 6^th), please contact organiser Pyers Pennant immediately.

On Sunday 21^st October, the Sussex Ladies Pairs Championship was held at Patcham.  Thirty-one pairs took part and Eddie Williams braved the sixty-two females to direct the competition.  Halfway through the event, there was an excellent tea which refreshed everyone after a close sixteen boards had been played.  The eventual winners were a new pairing playing for the first time - Kathy Williams and Barbara Pinto with 65.43%.  Many congratulations to them both.  Second were Chris Jepson and Liz Lancaster with 59.71% and they were closely followed by Sandy Blunt and Brenda Garrini with 59.55%.

The 4 pairs who have been chosen to represent Sussex in the Tollemache Cup Qualifier at Hinckley next month are :

-               Mick Carrington and Richard Fedrick,

-               Dave Clifton and Chris Jepson,

-               Dave Franklin and Gerry Stanford,

-               Ian Lancaster and John Frosztega.

The non-playing captain is Julian Mitchell.  We wish them all the best of luck.

Eleven young Sussex players between the ages of 8 and 15 all did very well in the Junior weekend at Loughborough recently.  In particular, James Hobden (15) was invited to trials for the under-19 squad, Tom Fedrick (9) together with dad Richard finished 12th in the Saturday night tournament and Aimee Humphrey won the individual prize in the ‘Mini Monsters’ group.

We need to encourage youngsters into the game and our special thanks go to Dave Armstrong and his wife Jill for taking the youngsters and coaching them.  If anyone has any children or grandchildren who would like to learn the game or has ideas on how to promote junior bridge, please contact Dave or call him on 01273 566101.

The Autumn Congress was held at Steyning between 21^st and 23^rd September.  It was very successful, mainly due to the smooth running from the organiser Neil Watts and the excellent directing from Chris Barrable and John Taylor.  Pictured left are Mike Keeping, Richard Burnett, Richard Newton and Matt Read being presented by Chairman Jackie Clinton with the cup for winning the final event - the Swiss Teams.  Other winners were .....

....Joan Hootman and Andrea Galpin who won the Ladies Pairs.

You can find details of all winners at the Autumn Congress in the 'Results' section of this site.