Nordic Junior Team Bridge Championships June 24 - 28, 2003

Nordic Junior Team Bridge Championships, June 24 - 28, 2003, Turku - Åbo
EXPLANATION
ROUND III
DENMARK A - FINLAND B
There has been a few questions why
Denmark A - Finland B match has such an
odd result as 24 - 3½. The original score was
actually 4 - 25 but since Denmark A was late
from the beginning and late at the end, they
lost one whole point, and since Finland was
late at the end, they lost ½ points, and the
final result became oddish sounding 24 - 3½.
Six Spades
In top match Norway B - Denmark A, East
was playing a reasonable solid slam, 6
spades. After heart lead East must quess how
to handle spades. What would be the best
way or is this only an educated guess? East
played first the King of Spades and since the
distribution was unfortunate to the declarer,
the game was set.
Round VII, Deal 35
♠ K852
♥ AKJT
♠ J
♥ 87632
♦ AJ43
♣ 984
N
♠ AQ97
♥ 54
♦ 5 W E ♦ KQ762
♣ KJ76 S ♣ A2
♠ T643
♥ Q9
♦ T98
♣ QT53
Story of Two Diamonds
In the match between Sweden A and Finland
B, Teija from Finland made a very good play
in a curious contract.
North East South West
Svivelind Bäckström Ericsson Niemistö
pass pass 1 ♣
1 ♠ pass 1 NT 2 ♦
All pass
2
Round II, Deal 22
♠ A92
♥ AK
♠ KQ765
♥ QT
♦ Q96
♣ JT6
N
♠ JT43
♥ 8543
♦ AT3 W E ♦ J82
♣ A8743 S
♣ K9
♠ 8
♥ J9762
♦ K754
♣ Q52
Facing a difficult rebid, and not wanting to
double with only 2 hearts, Teija (Niemistö)
chose 2 ♦ and nobody had anything to add to
this bid. Kjell’s (Ericsson) lead, the Queen of
hearts would not be everybody’s choice but
it was not bad either. Teija could count 6
tricks directly, 7 tricks with a club ruff but
where to get the precious 8 th trick? She
played the Ace of hearts, then King of hearts,
Ace or clubs, King of clubs and a club ruff.
Now if she tries to ruff a heart, contract can
not be made. Instead, she played the Ace of
spades and continued with a spade! Kjell
could take the second spade but then he had
no good continuation. If he returned
diamond, eighth trick will come from the
combination of J8-AT3, and if he played a
spade, it would allow a ruff for that precious
trick.
There might be an interesting play in 3 NT,
and certainly 1NT on N/S is hard to make but
as we say in Sweden “in is in”.
Björn Thalén (Sweden B)
Editor’s addition: In the other table NS pair
played 1 NT with three down.