Bridge - The Scotsman 05/06/2012

The Scottish team performed well at the Senior Camrose, apart from a disastrous second match against the winning sponsor’s team. Scotland were defeated 24-4 (both teams fined 1VP for slow play). Apart from two adverse slam swings, Scotland lost imps on little deals like this one.

Over North’s 1H John Matheson overcalled 1NT and played there. Dummy was disappointing, and Matheson made two hearts, a spade, a diamond and two clubs, going one down. In the other room Tony Waterlow chose a trap pass with the East hand, leaving Irving Gordon to play 2S. Victor Silverstone led his doubleton club, ruffed the third round and switched to the nine of hearts, taken with the ace, Gordon played dummy’s last club, discarding his second heart as Silverstone ruffed again. A heart now sets up a trump promotion, but Silverstone played a diamond to the jack and ace. Gordon finessed in spades, losing to the king. Waterlow gave him a chance by playing the king of hearts. Declarer ruffed and drew the remaining trump with dummy’s ace:

A ruffing heart finesse makes the contract, but Irving had already seen East produce 15 points. Could he really have the queen of hearts as well? When he played for a 3-3 heart break he too was one down, losing 5 imps.