Captaining a bridge team in a knock-out competition can be a thankless task. Sometimes, the hardest thing of all is simply finding a date when everyone can play. Several years ago, for instance, I managed to get my dream teammates for the Hubert Phillips Bowl: David Gold, Andrew Robson and Alexander Allfrey. Trying to arrange our very first match nearly gave me a nervous breakdown: our opponents offered five possible evenings over a four-week period (which was all they were required to do). After hundreds of emails to and fro, it became clear that there was simply no evening we could all do — and we were forced to concede the match before playing a single card.
This year I’m on Sarah Dunn’s team, and there are six of us (only four play in any one match, of course) — so matches are far easier to arrange.
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