North Penn Bridge News

Greetings to the

North Penn Bridge Community!

Week of 02/06/2023

From the Club Manager

Dave Dodgson

We had our first 0-299 section game last Thursday. Thanks everyone for attending. The 299’er section had five and a half tables, while the open section had four. You open players need to come out and not let yourselves be outnumbered.

Double-sided Score Sheets. The club has recently acquired these economical score sheets so you can use them twice before throwing them away.

February Schedule.

February 6-10: All club games are for the benefit of Education Fund Week. There are extra points and an additional $1 fee.

February 9: 0-299 game at noon. Please sign up in advance as follows:

Email Pat Andrews at [email protected]
Email the club at [email protected]
Sign up in the book at the club, specifying that you want to play in the 0-299 game

February 13-17: STaC - silver points are available; an additional $1 fee will be charged.

February 18: Robot Individual at 4 p.m.

February 20-24: All club games are for the benefit of Education Fund Week. There are extra points and an additional $1 fee.

February 27-March 3: Club Championships with lots of extra points!

Grand National Teams. Congratulations to the NP team of Susan Morse (captain), Alison Shoemaker, Dave Dresher, and Dave Dodgson who finished in a tie for third in Flight B of District 4 GNT. There is still time for teams in other flights to register and play. See our website, or the bulletin board in the club, for more details.

Education

Joann Glasson’s Bridge Lessons. February lessons are Monday the 13th and Monday the 27th. Click here for full details.

Tuesday Night's Lesson for Advancing Beginners. Time - 7:00 to 9:00 pm. Come out and put into practice what you’ve recently learned about doubles, preempts, overcalls and no-trump responses. Drop-ins welcome. $20 for the session.

Shuffle & Deal continues Tuesday evenings and Wednesday mornings.

Partnership

To add your name to the player list or to request a partner for a game, please send an email to [email protected].

Calendar

Click here to see a file you can enlarge.

We update our Facebook page regularly so be sure to check it out. It’s a great way to stay in touch with all the happenings at North Penn.

Tidbits

“Special Leads for Special Situations. There are a number of special or conventional leads associated with particular auctions that are used widely by experts:

Against Gambling 3NTs. Lead an ace. Take a good look at both dummy and your partner’s signal and try to find your partnership’s strongest suit immediately.

Against 6 or 7 Notrump Contracts. Lead passively and try to disguise your honor card holdings and distribution.”

From How the Experts Win At Bridge

by Burt Hall & Lynn Rose-Hall

Deal of the Week

by Mitch Snyder

Good Bot, Bad Bot

This deal occurred in a BBO robot game. Sometimes they play well and sometimes not so much. I lucked out on this hand, my partner was able to carry out a simple auction without a mistake but the defense was so bad that they ruined my opportunity to execute a squeeze!

To see the hand Click here

The auction:

After a routine 2C opening bid, I ended up in 3NT. The 3S bid by north was minor suit Stayman. It promises both minors (at least 5-4), shows a willingness to explore for a minor suit slam and warns opener about major suit shortness.

The play:

After a spade lead I can count 9 running tricks and an easy 10^th in diamonds but can I do better? Yes, I can make 3 diamonds tricks if I can avoid losing a trick to the 10.

There’s no sense in using dummy’s only entry to take a finesse that only gains when precisely K10 doubleton is onside and may cut you off from the last diamond if the king is held up twice.

The best way to play diamonds for 3 tricks is to cash the ace and lead towards QJ8 in dummy. This line works whenever west has the king (you may need to return to hand to repeat the finesse) or the 10 falls on the first or second diamond or the diamonds are 3-3.

I cashed the ace. The 10 fell. 3 diamond tricks were mine once I dislodged the king. I led the 9, (an unnecessary, in this case, precautionary unblock but a good habit to develop), and east hopped up with the king.

East assumably took the king in order to return partner’s suit. If east holds up the king for even 1 round or returns the club queen immediately there will be no squeeze and you’d be reading about a different hand this week.

Now that 3 diamonds are available there are 11 tricks and 2 dummy entries. I wondered if there was a squeeze for a twelfth trick. This is matchpoints, y’know, every trick counts.

For a squeeze to work you need to rectify* the count and have at least two threat cards. The count is already rectified and the 9 of spades and jack of clubs are threat cards, so all I had to do was picture an end position that makes both threats available.

*you’ve lost all the tricks you can afford to lose

Since I want to be in hand for this 3 card ending I just cashed all my winners ending in hand and this lucky end position squeezes west. When I cash the last heart west has to give up the spade guard or bare the club king. The beauty of thinking like this is you don’t have to count any suits, in this case just watch for the jack of spades and if it doesn’t appear take your club. You don’t have to count anything.

Note that in the actual play west discarded all his spades on the run of the hearts making the squeeze a moot point.

Laughter is the Best Medicine

Bobby Wolff is playing with a client who has just driven a long distance to play in this tournament with Bobby. On the first hand Bobby cashes the AK of a suit, his partner playing high-low and when he leads the third round of the suit she doesn't trump. When Bobby asks her why she didn't trump, she says: "Bobby, I was just too tired."

Bridge humor from

Eddie Kantar