Match 15 - Chile

After 2 gruelling matches, our final match for the day is not going to be that much easier, Chile, the champions of the South American zone. On paper, Singapore is dropping out of the running and with time running out, we need a good result to have a sporting chance on the final day. At the playing venue, however, it didn't seem that bad for us, we were confident we still have a chance and perhaps tired by the schedule of matches, we just wanted to go in and play the match, giving it our best.

It is a stroke of good luck for us that we are playing Chile so late in the RR. The reason is that Chile and Jordan are the only 2 teams that are playing with 4 men. Thus, it is inevitable they are not as fresh and the long gruesome schedule takes its toil on them. Still, we pretty much played the whole RR too, so it isn't easy to fully concentrate fully. It rates to be a tight match.

You might think that the WYC is a nice, friendly place where everyone enjoys bridge. That is far from the whole picture. It is a world championship and every team is committed to do their best and to achieve something in the tournament. It is really very important to the players. Before every match , you can hear loud 'warcrys' from the Chilean and Israeli players. You can virtually feel their fighting spirit, their will to win. For us Asians, we are more restrained but there is no doubt we are every bit as determined to pull it through.

Bridge is a social game for many but for the real competitive players, especially for the contenders, it is almost a matter of life and death. Personally, in my short 'playing career' I have acheived many successes in local and overseas tournaments. However, the ones that are really memorable are the 'failures', most notably in the Korea PABF last year. We were pretty close but fell short at the end. I can vouch that several of us shed tears at the end... Thankfully, these are far and few in between and those who know me will recognise that if I play competitively, I give it all my best and will go for the win. Seriously, I'll never play just to sit in awe of my opps and let them roll over me. It applies to most of my teammates.. no defeatists will ever be successful at this game!

As mentioned, throughout the entire tournament, the Chileans showed great fighting spirit. Mathematically, they still have a chance to qualify if they have a fabulous showing inthe final 3 matches so there is no doubt that they will come at us. I have already played against my screenmate , Jack Smith , online and he is really a good player , probably the stronger player in his partnership, fearless in the bidding and thus, I was prepared for some action.

Well, the match started slowly with a few flat boards in a row.. not exactly what we hoped for...

An example of Jack's dynamic style:

NV against VUL you hold:

♠ T 9 5 3
♥ -
♦ A Q 8
♣ J 7 6 5 3 2

LHO opens 3H, RHO raised to 4H, do you bid?

Well Jack unhesitantly came in with 5C!! found his partner with AKx club and a good sac for -300. Luckily for us, the opps at the other table didn't find the cold game so we gained 4 imps instead of losing 8. Still, a fine example of what we would be expecting.

You can see their desire to win and you can also sense which side Lady Luck is on:

♠ A Q 5 3
♥ T 9
♦ K
♣ K Q 9 4 3 2


♠ J T 9 4 2
♥ Q J 7 5 2
♦ A T
♣ A

The Chilean pair at our table bidded it up to 6S even after checking Keycards! Well, my partner didnt find the H lead (From the bidding, it was declarer's suit ) On the D lead, declarer hurriedly threw a h from dummy, before taking the S finesse. Well, I was East and blessed enough to hold the K of S, so the slam went one off anyway. Our teammates rationally stopped in game for 12 imps.

After 12 boards the score was 28-11 imps in our favour We didnt know for sure but I can feel the flattish boards might mean the scores are really close. This might explain my action on the next hand: (This board created 13 imp swings in 8 of the 9 matches in youth category!)

All vul,

I held:

♠ A K J T 9 8 4
♥ 7 3
♦ K Q 7
♣ A

After 2 passes, I opened 1S, partner raised to 2S. We were playing Drury(one of my favourite conventions) so 2S is really narrowly defined to be 6-9 HCp with 1.5 to 2 covercards. What is your bid?

Well, time is running out... I do know that slam is probably at best 50% (Give partner a K and an ace, note that he probably have S Q which is useless) so it is really a coin toss.. well, I decided I could improve my chances a little.. I bidded 2NT as a general game try, partner bidded 3C to show club values.. oh well.. not one to give up though, I tried 3H , showing some H values before launching blackwood over partner's 4S. I was quickly in slam when partner admitted to 1 KC.

Well, partner did have a maximum hand:

♠ Q 7 2
♥ A 9 5 4
♦ T 6 5
♣ K 8 5


♠ A K J T 9 8 4
♥ 7 3
♦ K Q 7
♣ A

Well, as expected the slam is 50% , dependent on the D ace. It was offside, so the slam rates to go down. However.. the effect of the bidding led my tired opp to lead the unbid suit and his natural lead in that suit was the Ace of D! I quickly claimed 12 tricks and a very lucky 13 imps.

That proved to be the turning point of the match... Lady Luck stuck with us:

First seat Vul:

♠ A Q 9 8 7 2
♥ 2
♦ J 7 2
♣ K 6 5

What do you open?

I chose to open a weak 2S while the Chilean player at the other table chose an agressive 1S. Partner held:

♠ J 4
♥ A 9 8 7 4
♦ Q 5 3
♣ A Q 2

We stopped in 2S while opps reached the very good game. Alas, the trumps was KTxx offside, so it will require doubledummy play to make game. Another lucky 6 imps.

When you are unlucky, nothing you do will turn out right:

♠ K J 6 5
♥ K T 9 7
♦ 8 2
♣ K Q 6


♠ A 8 4 2
♥ A 8 5 4
♦ A 5 3
♣ T 3

Both sides reached 4H. The critical play is to cater for a 4-1 break in trumps. My teammate did well to guess which way it was and made the contract. The Chilean declarer at my table chose the wrong view and went down after a few misguesses. 11 imps for us.

perhaps shaken by the string of bad results or that the tiredness of the long tournament got to him, the partner of Jack handed us our next swing:

♠ A 6
♥ J 5 4
♦ K Q J 7 6 3 2
♣ T


♠ K 8 3
♥ A K
♦ 8 4
♣ A J 9 7 6 2


Last board of the match, you play in 3NT on a S lead. It looks so easy.

I win the S lead in my hand and led the D 8 quickly. My LHO covered with the D 9 ... he had all 4 outstanding diamonds! I was awake enough to notice East discarding a H on the first D, so I returned back to hand to play another D for 10 tricks.

At the other table (and many others), my teammate followed small smoothly and declarer had no reason to get it right. 8 tricks was the limit and another 12 imps for us.

The late surge of results meant that we ended up an astounding 76-29 imp win (24-6 in VP). That great result meant we surged back into the top 4 with 2 matches to go. Boy, could we feel the tension.. how do we even go to sleep tonight?

1 USA 1 287
2 POLAND 271
3 FRANCE 268
4 SINGAPORE 263
5 ITALY 261
6 ISRAEL 254
NORWAY 254
8 EGYPT 250