The 51st European Championships, which are being played in Dublin, started last week, and at the time of writing England are doing brilliantly in all three classes: Open, Ladies and Seniors. Very sadly, Alexander Allfrey and his partner, the incomparable Andrew Robson, one of our pairs in the Open, had to pull out and reserves Tom Townsend and David Bakhshi stepped in.
One of the first times I played against Tom was at rubber bridge, where I found myself sitting against him on today’s hand. I lost a lot of money when Tom, technically one of the greatest players I have ever met, brought home this grand slam, but in terms of learning it was invaluable.
Tom ruffed my lead of the ♥A and cashed two rounds of trumps. He then put his cards down and thought for a long, long time.
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