The grand slam of Istanbul (Le Bridgeur Magazine n°886 – September 2014)

Article written by Jérôme Rombaut and published in the French magazine Le Bridgeur n° 886 on 15 September 2014.

Jérôme Rombaut was the captain of the Girls Team at the World Youth Team Championships held in Istanbul. He comes back from there with a spectacular deal.

Anne-Laure Huberschwiller, one of the pillars of my Girls Team (she will definitely play in the Women’s category soon), recently confided to me how much progress she made in card play thanks to Funbridge. Indeed, there is nothing like playing deals and comparing yourself to the best players to improve yourself.

Besides, will you be able to perform as well as our budding champions on this deal from the last World Youth Team Championships?

A Q J  J 8  A 10 7 4  A K 8 4

8 4  A K 10 9  K Q J 8 2  Q 2

Bidding  was not easy. Here is the convincing sequence by Lorenzini-Coudert:

S	W	N	E
Lorenzini		Coudert
			PASS
	PASS		PASS
(1)	PASS		PASS
	PASS		PASS
	PASS		PASS
	PASS	(2)	PASS
(3)

(1) In theory, 5H but here the aim is simply to know the number of hearts opposite.
(2) The club king.
(3) You count 13 tricks, i.e. five diamonds, three clubs, one spade, two hearts and two ruffs in hearts.

How do you play on the diamond lead? Should you protect yourself from the hearts split 6-1 and play a second round of trumps before ruffing both hearts?

The French Thibault Coudert simply played heart ace-king without drawing any extra round of trumps and easily won his contract.

It is possible to slightly improve this plan by playing as follows: after the diamond 9 taken by the jack, cash the diamond queen, continue with heart ace-king, ruffed heart, club ace and queen, ruffed heart, club 8 ruffed by 8, diamond king, spade to the ace and the club king as thirteenth trick.

After the second round of trumps, the Polish declarer made the mistake of wanting to cash three rounds of clubs. East ruffed and after the overruff, no good news came from the majors (heart queen-second or spade king in West). One down.

This deal moved a mere 29 IMPs in the Girls’ category and 19 IMPs in the Juniors’ one!

A Q J  J 8  A 10 7 4  A K 8 4

6 5 3 2  5 3 2  5  J 10 9 7 3

K 10 9 7  Q 7 6 4  9 6 3  6 5

8 4  A K 10 9  K Q J 8 2  Q 2