The World Championships started today in Herning Denmark. There are 4 competitions - Open, Womens, Mixed and Seniors, with 24 teams contesting each event. Australia is represented in all of the events. Our team for the Seniors is the same as played in the APBF in China earlier in the year with the exception of Ian Thomson replacing Phil Gue playing with Terry Brown.

The qualifying stage is a round robin of 23 matches of 14 boards each. The top 8 teams will qualify for the quarter-finals. There is another event – the World Transnational Teams – that will run parallel to the final stages of the main competition. With any luck I will not have to give you the details of this event!

Day 1 sees us play Canada, China, Austria and Denmark.

Match 1: Canada

At our table 2♦ showing a bad weak 2 in either major, 3♦ was natural and forcing. George led a small heart. Declarer led a spade to partner’s T. Won the ♦ return in hand and trumped a ♠. Two more diamond entries to hand allowed the spades to be established and then cashed for twelve tricks. George was kicking himself for not leading a trump. Notice that this would have taken one of the entries out of the declarer’s hand prematurely which would have stopped them establishing the spades. Personally, I am not a great fan of leading trumps against slams so I would just chalk this up to bad luck.

At the other table Ian opened 3♠ and Terry raised to 4. Ian tells me that he could have made this by guessing better but he didn’t so that was -50 and -14 IMPs.

At our table George opened 2♣, and rebid 2N, I transferred to spades, and George ended in 3N. West led a heart so George was able to win cheaply in the dummy and had an easy run to 10 tricks. At the other table the auction was diYerent:

Declarer misguessed the clubs after a low club lead. With limited entries to the dummy and the bad heart break only one 8 tricks resulted for 10 IMPs to the good guys.

A 9 IMP win for 12.71 VPs, not a bad start to the event.

Match 2: China

A dangerous team that we know from the PABF.

The Chinese NS pair had a long and convoluted auction to the excellent contract of 6♣. Terry and Ian had a shorter auction to 3NT. 12 IMPs away on the first board.

A strange board! The Chinese East opened 1N and Terry and Ian both passed. They took 11 out of their 12 defensive tricks for 5 down and plus 250. Not bad but not great compared with the vulnerable game (or slam!) that was possible on their cards.

At the other table the opening was also 1N but the Chinese South tried 2D showing one major. Now EW found their spade fit and NS sold out to 3S (not surprising in the face of a strong NT opening). This made 9 tricks for 9 IMPs.

One-way traYic after the first board resulted in a 25 IMP win for 16.21 VPs

Match 3: Austria

West played in 4♠ on my lead of the ♦T. Declarer won the Ace in hand, played clubs ruYing the third round in the dummy. Now A and another trump. Declarer could make by drawing a third trump and leading a diamond towards the Q. Mysteriously they didn’t play a third trump and led a heart to the ace and a heart. George could have beaten them now by cashing the heart and exiting in either minor suit. Instead he played the fourth round of clubs. Declarer ruYed this and led a diamond towards the Q. I now had to lead a third diamond allowing him to pitch a heart or lead a spade giving up my trump trick. Declarer’s line of play was fairly bad and I suspect George had trouble visualising what had happened! A flat board but a missed opportunity.

I played 3N on the lead of the ♥T. The Q lost to the K and a low diamond switch to the K, followed by the ♥9. I won the A and took a winning diamond finesse. I now went wrong by cashing the Ace pitching a spade from the dummy. Better would have been to play a spade now and when the Q won I could establish my heart winner. One down seemed poor although most declarers in the field also failed by a trick. At the other table NS settled for a spade part score making 9 tricks for a gain of 6 IMPs to Austria.

Another 3NT contract with me at the helm. The ♥T was led to the Q, J and small. The ♦Q lost to the K followed by a low ♣ switch. The ♦A revealed the bad break, so I played a ♠, losing to the A, then covered the ♥5 with the 7. Now when the ♣ was returned I could play the third club, unblock the spades and establish the diamonds. West only had spades so had to put me in the dummy for nine tricks. They got one heart, 2 diamonds and a spade. East could not cash their ♥A since that would set up the ninth trick in hearts. At the other table the declarer failed by a trick on the same lead. 10 IMPs to us.

A disappointing loss by 12 IMPs for 6.52 VPs. Several missed opportunities.

Match 4: Denmark

At our table I opened 1♦, E overcalled 1♠, George bid 1NT and W bid 2♥ which ended the auction. West’s action seems very conservative since most people would play this as non forcing. Double seems much more normal. 1NTX would be at least 2 down. Our best contract is 2S but I’m not sure we would have got there! W lost 2 hearts and 2 diamonds for 140. I could have held him to 8 tricks by giving George a diamond ruY.

The bidding was diYerent at the other table!

I’m not sure how the play went but Maurits must have done well since he emerged with 11 tricks. If the defence starts with A, K and another ♦ you need to ruY with the J. Now a ♥ to the A and ruY a ♥, ♠A pitching a ♥, ruY a ♠, ruY another ♥, then ♣K dropping the Q and finesse the ♣9. I will have to find out whether that is what happened or if the defence was more friendly! A handy 6 IMP gain in what turned out to be a relatively low scoring match.

East opened 1D and George pushed the boat out a little with 3S. I have quite a few points but relatively soft values so I passed. E speculated with 3N which was passed back to me. Although my D honours seemed well placed for the declarer, it was likely that he would have trouble getting to the dummy so I tried the eYect of X. W thought about this for a while but made a wise choice not to bid 4H. I would have been much more confident doubling that! George led a spade to my 9 and the declarer’s K. He played ♦A and another ♦, I cleared the hearts and they could only make 7 tricks for -500.

At the other table South overcalled 1♠ (not my preference) and they had an uninterrupted auction to 3♣ making 10 tricks. 9 IMPs in the plus column.

It was not clear to me that 5H was the right action given my relatively balanced hand with 2 cards in each of their suits. At the same time I didn’t have much in the way of defence given that we had a 10 card fit and my other A was in partner’s suit. They led DK then switched to S8. Since I needed the C finesse for my contract there was little point finessing in spades. The K was also very likely to be oYside since there was no great reason for E to switch if they had the K. I drew trumps ending in dummy, finessed the C and had enough heart entries to ruY out the CK and get back to the established C for my eleventh trick. +850 while 4S was cold for EW.

At the other table Maurits and David let them play in 4H in an uncharacteristic display of restraint. Still 6 IMPs to us.

An 8 IMP win for 12.44 VPs

At the end of Day 1 we are in 6th place, but it is very early days. The other Australian teams are also doing well, the women in 4th, the mixed in 5th and the open in 7th.

Full results can be found at http://db.worldbridge.org/Repository/tourn/herning.25/microSite/Results.htm

Apologies for the delay in these reports – I am juggling sleeping with blogging. You can always find the latest at the above link.