Woodberry bridge club first opened in 1981. However due to Covid we had to wait until 2022 to celebrate the 40th anniversary. This was an event held at the Claremont Centre where the club currently holds its face to face Tuesday duplicates. The festivities consisted of an extended duplicate with a break for cake at half time, a fish and chip supper and then a quiz hosted by Steve Bush. Many thanks to Anne Catchpole for organising and the various club members who contributed to ensuring the day was a roaring success
In the bridge 24 pairs were playing for the Probst cup. A cup donated by legendary bridge player and director John Probst originally used for the seeded club teams championship. With that teams event discontinued it has now been rebranded as the trophy to be awarded for the clubs annual championship pairs. It was lovely to see John himself make it to the club as a founder member despite recent health issues. I celebrated this fact by handing him and Andrew Clery a top on the second board. However near the end Andy and John met long standing members Ken Barnett and Chantal Girardin and two of the boards were exciting slams.
Board 28
The auction was 1H-2S-4H-4S-5C-P-6H-All Pass
Ken made a try with 5C and Chantal rightly judged to bid six. The spade void looked useful but in fact it was the clubs that were the key here. Six hearts was cold of course but you have a choice of plays in clubs as you can pick up stiff K in South or the singleton club 10 (or potentially smaller club) in North by starting with the right club from dummy (small and jack respectively). I think North may well have led a stiff club if he had one so I think a low club is the right play and 1010 was recorded. The only other pair to bid the slam was Chris Watkinson and Elsa Nelson. Also of note was Richard Creamer and John Pemberton’s result of 5S*-2 as N/S for -500 which looked poor but because most of the field got the clubs right this was a rare successful adverse vulnerability save against 510!
Board 30
The auction was 1S-2D-3D-4D-4S-5D-5H-P-5S-P-6S-All Pass
Once East opens (which I think is fairly mainstream these days) and N/S bid up in diamonds it should simply be a question of six or seven for West but apart from Ken and Chantal only myself and Paul Huggins bid this slam. Against us Peter Rogers judged well to save in 7D for -800 (his partner Vijay Tymms had overcalled a weak 3D originally) but luckily for us that only got them 2 extra matchpoints.
After this round Ken and Chantal went on a rampage but it wasn’t quite enough. They finished 3rd with 60.81%. Nigel Freake and Rachel Bingham were 2nd with 61.44% but with a combination of luck and good play myself and Paul managed to win with 63.47%
