I hope you had a great festive season and wishing you all a happy New Year. 

I thought it may be worth dropping you a line around how the county teams are doing so far this year. We have played four matches and the results are as follows:

Unfortunately they are not as good as we would like – consistency seems to be a problem with either good stanzas or a pair performing well in any given match, but rarely the whole tea putting it together for the entire match. However, there have been enough positive signs that I do believe we can get some more sins under our belts. 

We have had 34 players represent the county so far this season, with a number of new players, which is great. 

Special mention to the top performers so far:

We have three matches to go – lets see what we can do in them! 

In addition to the normal county matches, we entered a team in the Tollemache competition, which is the annual National Inter-county team of 8 event. The team this year consisted of: Sandy Fulton, John Rolph, Lloyd Eagling, Stan Zygadlo, Frank Ball, Graham Lee, John Auld, Irene Auld, Mark Goddard. We came 11/16, having won 8 matches and drawn 1 – which is very creditable and better than many teams ahead of us (we just did not win big enough when we won). Our star performers were Stan and Lloyd.

I have been a bit lax on match reports recently, but there have been a lot of interesting hands. One of the more memorable ones was Board 12 of the November match against Gloucs. The hand may be seen above.

On best defence 4S cannot make (diamond lead and then there are two entries for diamond ruffs) and 4H cannot make – but at most tables they did (with the top heart being an obvious lead). 

The bidding would typically start with 2H by West and 4S by N at which point East has a choice of passing or bidding. It is a close call, but I think bidding 5H is correct given the vulnerability – on the auction, you do not appear to have 4 tricks to set 4S. After that the spotlight is on N – the correct answer is probably to double and you will get a plus score, however lured by the vulnerability I bid 5S…of course now I was in it I had to make it. 

The opposition started with a top heart and now the contract is cold, thanks to a precious card in dummy – the 8S! 

In practice, the opposition continued hearts which I ruffed high, cashed the AC and then led a low spade towards the precious 8. East won and continued hearts (nothing else works) and I could go to the 8 S and lead a top club which was covered by the K and ruffed. I ran all the spades and East is squeezed in the minors and I had to get the rest of the tricks. In order to beat it, a diamond lead is needed at trick 1 or 2 – trick 1 is hard to find, but trick 2 is possible as the assumption should be that N has at most a singleton and therefore W should signal for a diamond at trick 1 with a high card…though even then it is hard as could be giving a diamond trick away. 

If you do have any questions around hands (bidding or play), you can always email me and I would be happy to respond. 

Mark