|
By Brian Senior
The toughest and most prestigious
weekend event in the EBU calendar is the Spring Foursomes. Held
in Stratford over the bank holiday weekend at the beginning of May,
it attracts a number of strong teams from overseas plus the vast
majority of the tope players in England.
The Spring Fours is a dual elimination
teams competition. In other words, you play straight knockout matches
of 32 boards each and stay in the main event until you have lost
twice. This year, there were 48 teams, the perfect number for the
format to work perfectly.
Play began on the Friday evening
and the semi-finals and final were played on Tuesday - so not an
event for the faint-hearted. The last undefeated team get Monday
evening off while the six once defeated teams play the quarter-finals.
This year, the undefeated team was
MOSSOP (David Mossop, Tom Townsend, Jason and Justin
Hackett, Tony Forrester, Geir Helgemo), the previous year's winners.
It was just as well for them that they were undefeated because they
needed to use up that spare life in the semi-final against the tough
Scottish team, SPEARS (B. Spears, S. Kaluderic, M.
Dragic, D. Diamond).
SPEARS led by 28 IMPs after the first of the four sets and, though
MOSSOP won each of the remaining three sets, they still trailed
by 9 IMPs after 32 boards. The regulations gave them the right,
as the undefeated team, to claim an extra eight boards, and they
duly did so. The score in those extra eight deals was 30-5 in favour
of MOSSOP, who had recovered to win by 16 IMPs. This was the biggest
swing board of the extra set:
Board 35
E/W Vul
Dealer South
| |
|
|
10
9 8 7 |
|
| |
|
|
A 4 3 |
|
| |
|
|
A Q 8 7 5 |
|
| |
|
|
2 |
|
 |
K Q 6 5 |
|
|
A J 4 2 |
 |
Q 10 6 2 |
|
9 5 |
 |
6 3 2 |
|
10 |
 |
K
6 |
|
A
Q J 10 7 3 |
| |
|
|
3 |
|
| |
|
|
K
J 8 7 |
|
| |
|
|
K J 9 4 |
|
| |
|
|
9 8 5 4 |
|
| West |
North |
East |
South |
| Helgemo |
Kaluderic |
Forrester |
Spears |
| - |
- |
- |
Pass |
| Pass |
2 |
3
|
4 |
| Dble |
Pass |
4 |
5
|
| Pass |
Pass |
Dble |
All Pass |
Kaluderic tried an off-centre
natural weak two bid in third seat and Forrester overcalled.
Spears made a pre-emptive raise and Helgemo
doubled for take-out. When Forrester bid 4,
Spears judged well to save and Forrester in turn judged well to
settle for the penalty rather than go on to 5,
which would have failed by a trick. Forrester led his trump and
careful defence held Kaluderic to two spade ruffs in dummy and nine
tricks in all; -300.
| West |
North |
East |
South |
| Dragic |
Justin H |
Diamond |
Jason H |
| - |
- |
- |
Pass |
| Pass |
1 |
2
|
Pass |
| 2NT |
Pass |
3
|
Pass |
| 3NT |
All Pass |
|
|
The Hackett twins play
four-card majors and often open a major ahead of a longer minor
on minimum hands. This approach worked very well on the deal. Diamond
overcalled and Dragic responded 2NT. Now Diamond could
see that if his partner held a spade stopper there could be a spade
fit for his side and he bid 3,
intending this to be natural.
Alas, Dragic took 3
as just a forcing noise, double-checking that he really did want
to play in no trump. The surprise diamond lead allowed the defenders
to take the first seven tricks for three down; -300 and 12 IMPs
to MOSSOP.
If this last-gasp win suggested that
MOSSOP was the team of destiny, their illusions were swiftly shattered
in the final. BURN, four of the English team for this
year's World Team Olympiad in Maastricht in August (David
Burn, Brian Callaghan, Gunnar Hallberg, Colin Simpson), had coasted
through their semi-final against DIXON (C. Dixon,
K. Stanley, I. Gordon, R. Bennett) by 76-25 IMPs.
They proceeded to win the first set of the final against MOSSOP
by 52-0, and there was no coming back from that.
|
