Frank “Nick” Nickell goes to Lille

 leggi in italiano »

The Frank Nickell’s Team (Nickell, Katz, Zia, Hamman, Rodwell, Meckstroth), will represent the Usa in the World Mind Sports Games which will be held in Lille from 9 to 23 of August. They defeated John Diamond (Diamond, Platnick, Gitelamann, Moss, Greco, Hampson). In the semifinals, Nickell had defeated Milner (289-243), whereas Diamond had crashed Lee (282-112 in 90 of 120 hands). In the final, Nickell trailed 54 IMPs after 45 boards, but already in the fourth segment the gap diminished to 9 Imps, thus the final result has been 267-251.

The board 94 posed some interesting bidding questions.

East (the Openers: Platnik and Hamman): ♠A2 J8Q732 ♣AQJ82

West (the Responders: Diamond and Zia): ♠KQ87K7649865 ♣10

Platnick opened 1NT (14-16 in first position being NV. 1♣ would have been conventional). Diamond, his partner, has a 4-4-4-1, the right pattern to try for a major game without being condemned to play 2NT if the response were negative. After 1NT-2♣, then, he passed the Partner’s 2, a contract not so bad even finding only a three card support. This treatment comes from an idea of Skidelsky John Simon (1904-1948), the English author of the funniest bridge book ever written, “Why you lose at bridge”, called Skid by his friends of Acol Street in London. It must be noted, however, that Simon played natural 1♣ opening and four card major, so he didn’t risk to find the 1NT’s Opener with a pattern 3-3-2-5, as Diamond did with that pointless diamonds.

In the other table the Old Lyon opened 1♣, being prepared to rebid 2♣ over the response 1♠, or 1NT over 1, the Zia’s actual response. The result of the board were 1NT-1 and 2 made, 4 Imps to Diamond.

***

May 07, 2012

(Visited 363 times, 1 visits today)
Content Protected Using Blog Protector By: PcDrome.