The European Open Pairs, the final event in Montecatini, was a long and arduous five-day slog, three of those days qualifying about a quarter of the field for the two-day final. Long Pairs events often feature a period when things are tough and it seems impossible to get any Matchpoints. How you play during these
I’ve just returned from two weeks playing in the European Open Championships in Montecatini in Italy, and I’m so whacked I can hardly get out of bed. Playing pressurised bridge for nearly ten hours a day is exhausting, but try doing it under the relentless heat of the Tuscan sun, in a huge tent with
The past two weeks have seen hundreds of passionate bridge players head for Montecatini in Italy for the 8th European Open Championships. The first two events, Mixed Teams and Mixed Pairs, had possibly the most exciting finals of all time — both successful gold medallists winning on the heart-stopping last board. The Pairs saw Poland’s
How is it possible to be assigned four ‘away’ matches on the trot? Strange, but that’s how it was for my Young Chelsea team, competing in the National Inter-Club Knockout: lots of driving down country lanes in Essex or Buckinghamshire in the gloaming, seeking out our opponents’ houses. At last, when it came to Round
Every time I read Andrew Robson’s bridge column and he mentions that ‘a reader from wherever’ sent him an interesting hand, I feel the putrid green god of envy enter my body and make its way slowly into my heart. Why? Why him? I ask myself. Why doesn’t some reader from ANYWHERE send me a
It’s the funniest bridge story I’ve heard in ages. At the recent Lady Milne championship (the women’s Home Internationals), one of the English pairs was fined a point for slow play during their match against Ireland. The pair insisted that they hadn’t been particularly slow — indeed they’d bid to a grand slam rather quickly
The last days of May see all the ongoing tournaments coming to an end: both TGR’s and Young Chelsea’s Super Leagues are drawing to a close for another season and the main tournaments, my favourite being the Schapiro Spring Foursomes, are over for another year. There are European and World Championships coming up over the
Long after my own team had been knocked out of this year’s Spring Fours in Stratford-on-Avon (the most prestigious and enjoyable tournament of the year), I was still glued to the action. And even more so when the two teams who made it to the final turned out to be two I normally root for
I realised long ago that I almost never play bridge with a partner worse than me. Occasionally, I cut a palooka at rubber bridge — but they probably think the same about me. I mainly play with professionals and they always have something kind and constructive to say when the defence goes pear-shaped: ‘Cover an
Janet likes to tease me that whenever it’s my turn to write this column, it ought to be renamed The David Gold Experience. Well, maybe I do write about him a lot, but then again, he is one of the best players in the world. Anyway, this week I’ve decided to give David’s regular partner
Last week we played round four of the Gold Cup. I had eagerly looked at the email to see who we were up against and for the first time ever we had drawn… Susanna’s team! Her partner was rubber-bridge maven Graham Orsmond, with Brian Ransley and Brian McGuire at the other table. The match was
Not many people can say they’ve partnered David Gold and been the better player — but I’m one of them. Admittedly, it was 20 years ago. He was 17 and had been playing for about a month when he decided to test his skill in the pound game at St John’s Wood bridge club. I’d
Bridge 24 was set up seven years ago by four Polish internationals who wanted to bring the glory days of the Eighties and Nineties back to Polish bridge: teach kids, organise seminars and start winning medals again. They have succeeded magnificently. Poland are the reigning world champions and Michal Klukowski, at 17, became the youngest
We all know how important it is to stop and think when defending a hand. There’s just one problem with that advice: sometimes it’s equally important not to stop and think. Every hesitation gives something away — and although it often doesn’t cost you anything, it can prove fatal. I regularly find myself having to
‘Ducking is for experts. Don’t try it.’ So says my partner Artur Malinowski every time I duck a trick in defence and let the contract through. Nice to know that experts also get it wrong, as was spectacularly demonstrated in the semi-final of the Vanderbilt Teams held in Kansas City recently. The two Davids (Bakhshi
Everyone knows him, but hardly anyone can pronounce his name — which is why Jacek Pszczola is universally called Pepsi. He’s Polish, of course, but lives in the US, and is one of the world’s most successful — and popular — bridge pros. He does, however, have one very disconcerting habit. As soon as he’s
Tournament bridge players do not expect, or get, much in the way of luxury. I have played in some of the scuzziest venues imaginable (don’t get me started on Tromso’s Portaloos or Menton’s suffocating heat), so it is a rare treat that sponsor Simon Gillis’s Lederer Memorial Trophy is held at the super elegant RAC
There are plenty of bridge professionals who believe in flattering lesser players (whether they’re clients, friends or spouses) by exaggerating how well they play, or claiming their mistakes are perfectly understandable. Not so Espen Erichsen. Espen is a great player and I like him enormously, but he’s also the most blunt-talking man I’ve ever met.
February is probably the most exciting and glamorous month in the bridge calendar. A couple of weeks ago, über-sponsor Pierre Zimmermann held his Cavendish Monaco Teams and Auction Pairs tournament, which attracts the best players in the world, all vying for a chance to pick up the big player’s pot or score in the auction.
If there’s one tournament I’d really like to play in, it’s the Cavendish in Monaco, the largest money bridge tournament in the world. Last Sunday, the winners of the main auction pairs, the Bulgarians Diyan Danailov and Jerry Stamatov, scooped the players prize of €16,000, and whoever bought them for €12,000 won €100,000. But it’s
