After a relaxing morning – on the beach, around the pool – or a more strenuous one – walking along the promenade to Side and back – the more serious bridge started again today.
Nineteen teams played six eight-board matches of Swiss Teams to determine the qualifiers for the final, to be played over 32 boards on Saturday. Board 2 was interesting:
With an abundance of tricks if the hearts and spades break, and the chance of a thirteenth if the hearts behave and the spades don’t, but a fairly safe twelve tricks, most pairs stayed in 6H.
However, two pairs bid the grand slam and played in and made 7NT. One of these was the scratch pair of Alan Patel and Steve Wadman. Steve had stepped in at the last minute to play when Alan’s partner, Becky, was unwell.
Their optimistic auction was
South North
2C 2S
3H 4NT
5H 5NT
6D 7NT
Their well-founded optimism led to a swing of 1600 and a massive 17 IMPs.
At the end of the day, five teams had qualified for the main final:
- Orsmond (Graham Orsmond, Jackie Fairclough, Debbie Sandford and Gad Chadha)
- Lawson (Judy Lawson, Ollie Burgess, Sandy Davies and Tom Gisborne)
- Blakey (Joy and Irving Blaket, John Holland and Raymond Semp)
- Hopkins (Tish Hopkins, Jacqui Farrar, Christina Powne and Tim Emmott)
- Davies (Stuart Davies, Nichola Cockerill-Smith, Catherine Thompson and Lesly Bridson)