A rollercoaster ride!
Hi everyone!
I’m back to talk about the Mixed Teams National Division. As in the Mixed Pairs, I played with Anaïs Leleu, and we had a score to settle. Last weekend didn’t go very well and we were relegated from Mixed Pairs ND1. We were therefore determined to perform and show that it was just a blip.
Our team consisted of:
- Mathilde, playing with my dad
- Vanessa, playing with Alexandre Allard
- and myself, with Anaïs
Last year, already with Anaïs and Mathilde in the team, we finished 2nd, just 1 IMP short of 1st place in the same event. The atmosphere within the team was excellent. Unfortunately, my dad had a few issues and was unable to play on Saturday. Vanessa and Alexandre played all their matches together, and I played a few with Mathilde.
A well-managed first day
We started with an 18.5–1.5 victory against Team Bello, one of the strongest teams in the event! We continued with another win, 16–4, which put us at the top of the rankings after two matches.
Unfortunately, our third match was less successful —especially on my side— and we lost 6.5–13.5.
Thankfully, we finished the day strongly with another big win, 18.5–1.5, leaving us in 3rd place, very close to the leaders at the end of Day 1.
Deal 1: A well-bid slam
Here’s my hand with nine master spades. It’s not every day you hold a nine-card suit headed by ace, king, queen and jack!
Anaïs opened 1♦, I responded 1♠ as usually. She rebid 1NT and I said 2♦ (Two-way Checkback), an artificial game-forcing bid in our system. She responded 2♥ to show her four hearts. I then bid 3♠, showing at least six spades and hope for slam.
She responded 3NT. We hadn’t discussed it, but we both agreed that this bid should show two small spades.
Not worried by her spade « problem », I started cuebidding and chose not to show my diamond control, as I held a void in her suit. I bid 4♥ instead.
Here Anaïs made the right decision by bidding Blackwood. She showed a hand with 12–14 HCPs and two spades, and since I was still interested in slam despite that, she thought she held nice cards. I didn’t respond to Blackwood and jumped to 6♠, which seemed the right contract to me.
Indeed, on the club lead I had no difficulty to play the ace, discard my heart on the ace of diamonds, and ruff a club to make twelve tricks.
Note that the lead of the ace of hearts would have made things trickier to make my contract, and the lead of a small heart under the ace would have defeated it… But that was impossible to find at the table.
Deal 2: A defensive careless mistake
The opponents reached 3NT in North–South, and my partner led the 4 of hearts.
Looking at dummy, if declarer plays a small heart, I will win and switch to spades since between declarer’s clubs and dummy’s diamonds, they can stop hearts twice more, and we won’t have time to establish them before they make nine tricks.
With three small spades in dummy, playing a spade seemed to be a better bet. But surprisingly, declarer played the king of hearts from dummy, so I put my ace. Unfortunately, I didn’t think deeply enough. I didn’t ask myself why declarer played the king despite that it’s quite surprising and unusual. Surely it was to secure nine tricks quickly, fearing a switch. Here the only possible suit is spades.
Afterwards it seemed obvious to return a spade… But unfortunately, at the table I wasn’t sharp enough and lazily continued with a heart, thinking there was no urgency in playing a spade and that my partner might do it later. But Anaïs’s play was normal: she established her heart, hoping I would regain the lead in clubs or diamonds to cash five tricks.
It turned into a disaster: the jack of hearts became declarer’s ninth trick, while we had four « open » spade tricks available. I’m cross with myself on this deal. A reminder never to rush. You need to take your time to avoid careless mistakes. After the ace of hearts, I had to switch to spades, not hearts as declarer who put dummy’s king of hearts necessarily has a spade problem.
Fortunately, it didn’t cost us too much. We still won this half by 40 IMPs thanks to lots of good decisions.
Deal 3: A 6NT squeeze in the half
I opened 1NT with a singleton spade. The thing is if I open 1♣ and my partner responds 1♠ (which is likely), I have no interesting rebid with this distribution (15–16 HCPs and a stiff honour in spades). So I always open 1NT. We eventually reached 6NT.
On the lead of the 9 of hearts (top of nothing), I could count:
- 3 heart tricks
- 3 club tricks
- 2 diamond tricks
- and 2 spade tricks after knocking out the ace
That’s ten tricks already. If clubs are 3–3, that’s twelve. But we don’t need to rush with clubs straight away. If they’re 3–3, they’ll still be later.
Let’s try to come up with another plan in case something bad happens:
- If the hearts are 3–3, it could bring me an eleventh trick.
- There’s also the diamond finesse for an eleventh trick.
- And there are various squeezes involving clubs, spades and hearts.
After the heart, I won in my hand and returned the jack of spades. The best defence would have been to duck to create more problems for me, but my opponent won directly and played a heart.
I then decided to test my hearts. Good news! They’re 3–3. That already gave me eleven tricks. I cashed my fourth heart, discarding a spade from dummy, crossed back to the king of clubs, then cashed spades. At that point, West was squeezed between their fourth club and the queen of diamonds.
So I could win:
- 2♠
- 4♥
- 3♦
- 3♣
That’s twelve tricks and 990 to us.
I knew that this deal was a turning point: we were right back in contention for winning this last match!
Day 2: An incredible finish!
My dad arrived for Day 2. It’s always a pleasure to play with him, we’re partners in Open.
Unfortunately, we started with the worst possible result: a 55–1 IMP defeat (20–0).
A terrible match for us against our friends Luc Bellicaud and Margaux (aka MKB), who played very well. We didn’t take any right decisions. It happens.
This defeat had a major impact as we dropped to 8th place after five matches. Thankfully, our team-mates immediately bounced back with a 14.5–5.5 win.
Next came a crucial match against Team Nataf. We had to win to keep podium hopes alive and possibly finish as leaders. We did with a 16.5–3.5 win in a well-played match for both sides.
Before the final match, we were 3rd, just 3 VPs behind the leaders, whom we were about to face. It was the perfect opportunity for a big win and grabbing the first place. And that’s exactly what happened. Anaïs and I had a dream match. We won 61–9, that is 20–0, and we took 1st place!
Conclusion
When the final leaderboard was confirmed, we were over the moon. These are the moments we play bridge for. Taking first place in the final match is incredible. The team spirit was fantastic throughout. I’m so happy to have won with them.
We also had little Agathe (my team-mate Mathilde and Clément’s daughter) cheering us on to finish the day. She celebrated her first birthday and later happily played with her mum’s medal.
Well done to everyone!
No rest for me. The next day I flew to Prague to play the Winter Games with the French squad. Hopefully I’ll keep the same momentum.
Thank you all for reading and following our adventure.
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