Bridge is a tough game which needs a ton of focus and concentration, and as a result when one observes a bridge session in progress with a lot of people saying nothing, with furrowed brows and occasional glances up at the heavens, it looks like a long way from people having fun!

But they are, and even if “fun” may not be the right word they are enjoying the process and the competition, and when the session is over they can breathe out and re-enter the normal world.

All of this is, however, more than intimidating to a new player and takes some time getting used to – and the Club is taking some initiatives to make that easier.

One of these is a Social Bridge Afternoon, the first of which is tomorrow, April 21, between 3pm and 5pm at the club on Pomander Road. This is open to all, no sign-up required, just show up, meet some new people and have and enjoyable afternoon in the company of others who would like to enjoy this great game of ours. You can come with or without a partner.

Today, see the playing of the Junior Open Championships at the Club – full results next week.

This week’s hand would probably fail in the hands of most declarers as the correct play is counter to the way they normally play a hand.

On most hands declarer holds the long trump suit and uses dummy’s trumps to ruff losers in declarer’s hand. Quite often, however, the roles can be reversed and that brings us to the hand today (see Figure 1).

The bidding was fairly good, but very ambitious on the part of South (see Figure 2).

South was looking for a big swing in a Team game and used Roman Key Card Blackwood to discover that North held two key cards (the Aces) and then the King of diamonds.

It was still rather ambitious to bid the grand slam with a count of only 11 top tricks: in fact, had dummy had three hearts and four clubs the grand slam would have been hopeless.

West led the King of hearts. Declarer saw that if trumps were 2-2 he would be able to play four rounds of diamonds, discarding two clubs from dummy, and then ruff two clubs in dummy, bringing home the contract.

A 2-2 trump break is, however, not likely and that play would fail on the given layout. Declarer then looked deeper and realised that the hand was best suited for a “dummy reversal” play, where the ruffing is done in the long trump hand, so he aimed for three heart ruffs in the South hand, making seven trump tricks and the contract.

So, declarer ruffed a heart at trick two and crossed to dummy with a diamond to the King to ruff a second heart. Declarer then led a trump to dummy in order to ruff a third heart high.

Declarer had one trump left in his hand so he drew all three of East’s remaining trumps with dummy’s Ace, Jack and nine while discarding his two low clubs. As his hand was now high (with three top diamonds and the Ace of clubs), declarer claimed 13 tricks.

Well played to rescue a great result from some not-so-great bidding – note that if West had been dealt a trump then he would defeat the grand slam by leading one as it cuts down an entry to dummy for declarer.

BRIDGE CLUB RESULTS

Friday, April 12

1. Gertrude Barker-Sharon Shanahan

2= Judith Bussell-Ruby Douglas

2= Aida Bostelmann-Heather Woolf

Monday, April 15

1. Joyce Pearson-Richard Hall

2. Gertrude Barker-Jane Smith

3. Patricia Siddle-Diana Diel

Tuesday, April 16

1. Malcolm Moseley-Benjamin Stone

2. Amanda Ingham-Heidi Dyson

3. Jamie Sapsford-Jane Dowling

Wednesday, April 17

North/South

1. Charles Hall-Tony Saunders

2. Gertrude Barker-Jane Smith

East/West

1. Judith Bussell-Ruby Douglas

2. Greta Marshall-Heather Woolf

Thursday, April 18

1. Linda Pollett-William Pollett

2. David Petty-Delton Outerbridge

3. Gertrude Barker-Molly Taussig