Just off the podium in the U26
My first European Junior Championship
Last year, I played my first Junior Championship alongside Romaric Guth, who had to step in for Luc after he became too old for the category 👴. I therefore joined the team for the World Championship in Salsomaggiore, and everything went really well, both with Roro as my partner and within the team as a whole 🙂
This time, I am competing in the U26 category again, but with a completely different team: Esteban Vallet and Romain Bloch, Eulalie Bonin and Arthur Libbrecht, and my partner Farès Ait Mouhoub.
The competition is played as a round robin, which means that we face each of the other 22 teams once. The same format applies to the other categories—Girls U26, U31 and U21—except that they play a double round robin, facing each team twice.
A well-timed balancing bid
Here is my hand in South. I passed initially, and the bidding came back to me after 3♣ – Pass – Pass. It seems very suspicious that I hold 8 points, that East passed originally, and that West still decided to pre-empt my partner. I know the points are probably split at least 20–20, and I do not want to let the opponents play 3♣ non-vulnerable against vulnerable, especially if they might make it.
The fact that my partner passed strongly suggests that they do not have five spades—or even a five-card suit—which increases the chances that we have a fit in one of my red suits. I am therefore very tempted to balance, but unfortunately I cannot make a takeout double with only two spades.
So I balance with 3♦. Since I passed initially, my partner should expect a good five- or six-card suit, as we do not play weak two bids in diamonds, together with around 9 or 10 points.
Over 3♦, Farès bid 3NT with his 15 points and a club stopper. He had no trouble making the contract after the lead of the 10 of spades. The key is simply to play dummy’s doubleton honour, then take the heart finesses towards East, who cannot safely return a spade without giving away the queen.
I think it would have been better for him to bid 3NT immediately with his hand. Since East had passed originally, he was unlikely to be doubled by anyone, and as we were vulnerable against non-vulnerable opponents, the game bonus was worth the risk.
That said, with three clubs, he had good reason to expect me to balance—although that did not happen at many of the other tables 🙂
A board played by Zoey Mauberquez (Team Girls)
Hi everyone, Zoey here! After spending a week in Riga competing with the French Girls team, I’m back to tell you about an interesting board I played with Maëva Bultel as my partner.
I was sitting East — always East for my father, Erick! I opened 1NT and South passed. We were all vulnerable, and she decided not to come in with a Landy bid. Maëva then used one of my favourite conventions: 3♥, which in our system shows precisely a heart shortage, three spades and 5–4 in the minors. A bid of 3♠ would show the same hand, but with hearts and spades reversed.
We generally prefer to make this bid with a small singleton, since here she already had a heart stopper with the ace. However, sometimes it is still better to play five of a minor rather than 3NT, particularly at teams, where making 5m exactly instead of 3NT+1 is not a problem. Over 3♥, I decided to bid 4♦. I had no heart stopper, so 3NT was not an option. I also had some attractive cards for a slam if my partner held a strong hand. Maëva, who had no slam ambitions, signed off in 5♦.
In the play, the jack of clubs lead suggested a shortage, so I abandoned the idea of establishing the clubs and drew trumps instead. With the trumps breaking 2–2 and the ace of spades onside, I was able to ruff a heart and a spade in the short hand without any difficulty.
At the other table, our opponents played 3NT. The contract goes down if the defence leads a heart and cashes four heart tricks and the ace of spades — but defenders need to be very careful about which cards they play.
After the lead of the 7 of hearts, fourth-best, North followed with the 2 as a count signal. When she later regained the lead with the ace of spades, she returned the 6 of hearts.
However, she would have defended in exactly the same way from 6-4-2. South therefore assumed that this might be her holding and ducked the trick, hoping that North had another entry.
North would have done better to return the 3 of hearts, as in this situation a low card is encouraging.
How should the trump suit be handled?
This deal was interesting both from the declarer’s and the defenders’ point of view. In theory, the defence can defeat the contract from the opening lead as soon as it scores a diamond ruff, the ace of hearts and two spade tricks.
On a diamond lead, the defence is straightforward: East, realising that the lead is a singleton, plays the 10 of diamonds as a heart suit-preference signal. Then, when West gets in with a spade, they can switch to a heart from under the king and receive the diamond ruff.
Even on a club lead, the defence should still be able to defeat the contract, since West gets on lead twice in trumps. West can therefore play the diamond singleton and reach the same position.
After a club lead, declarer actually needs to play a heart immediately to cut the defenders’ communications in the suit—a scissors coup.
At the table, I received a club lead and, without considering the possibility of a singleton diamond, focused on how to handle the spade suit. I had one heart loser, so I needed to restrict my spade losers to two. If trumps were 3–2, that should not be a problem.
Otherwise, I needed to protect myself against a 4–1 trump break. Cashing the ace only protects against a 4–1 split when the singleton spade is on my left, with West. By leading a spade towards the 8, it seemed to me that I would lose only to the singleton 10 with West.
West won with the 10 and returned a club towards my hand. I then led another spade from hand towards dummy’s 7.
And when trumps are 3–2, this is also the best way to lose only one trick in the suit, hoping to find East with the doubleton 10, either with or without another honour, after a Buffalo coup!
A little glimpse of Riga…
We really made the most of the area: we went swimming at Riga beach, explored the city centre once again, and spent our final evening singing karaoke and playing pool to celebrate the end of the championship!
#MaevaThePoolChampion, giving us lessons
#ClaraAndSaveriaInTheBueno
A few bad decisions in a row…
As usual, I was sitting South. This is not really my usual style, but I decided to open 1NT with 15 points and a singleton king of spades. My reasoning was that after 1♦ – Pass – 1♠ – Pass – 2♣ – Pass – 2♦, I would be slightly too weak to bid 2NT, which would normally show around 16 or 17 points.
The auction continued 1NT – Pass – 2♥, a transfer to spades, followed by 3♥ on my right. I passed quite naturally, then saw Farès make a balancing double. At that point, I had several options: leave the takeout double in for penalties, suggest playing in a minor with 4NT, bid 4♦ on my five-card suit, or bid 3NT with my one-and-a-half heart stoppers. Any honour opposite would give me two heart stoppers, even a singleton queen or jack.
I chose 3NT, and it worked out very badly: I went four down, while 5♦ made comfortably. 5♣ would have gone down because East could score a diamond ruff. Bidding 5♦ was admittedly difficult, but quite a few players passed 3♥ doubled with my hand. I now think that was probably the best decision. At least I would have been fairly confident of recording a plus score—whereas here, I could easily imagine all the different ways the games I might bid could go down 😉
On the road to slam with Eulalie
Your turn!
You will be able to see my score at the end of the deal. I played this hand opposite Eulalie Bonin, the other girl on the team :). Only half of the U26 pairs reached the contract we played. At the other tables, North was the dealer. We had placed the board the wrong way round on the table!
Our system made 3NT easier to reach
2♣ is an artificial relay. It can be used either to play in 2♦, which is the compulsory response, or to show various types of game-invitational hands.
Farès therefore showed me an invitational hand with four hearts and five or six diamonds. Holding 14 points in South, I had no difficulty bidding 3NT, which I made by leading a club towards the 10. Only half the field reached this excellent game!
A slightly disappointing fourth place… but the U31s are European champions!
We finished just off the podium, and on a personal level, I was a little disappointed with some of the scorecards I brought back. I had clearly played a little better the previous week in the Women’s Championship, partnering Anaïs.
Still, it was a very respectable result, and it means that we will be able to compete again next year in Denmark and try to do even better!
Nao, Maxence, Arthur, Théo, Romaric and Luc dominated the competition and brought home the gold medal in the U31 category.
It was fantastic to sing La Marseillaise together with all the teams to celebrate! 🤠
In the U26 category, the Netherlands took the title, while Poland won the other three categories.
A huge thank you to my teammates and our captain, who were absolutely lovely throughout the week ❤️
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