High-level Decisions
Newcastle Herald
Friday February 5, 1999
FOLLOWING their eighth place in the South West Pacific Teams in Canberra, members of the Parfait team were `over the moon' and qualified for the finals of the National Open Teams.
They met the Rothfield team in the `round of 16'. Michael Parfait had to go home before the finals so that left Chris Dibley, Mike Seldon, Louis Woo and Paul McGrath to battle Jessel and Carol Rothfield, Ishmael Del Monte, Bob Richman, Seamus Browne and Khokan Bagchi ? all well known names.
In fact, this team represented Australia in the most recent World Championships. Parfait begrudgingly thought Rothfield was entitled to feel favourite.
The match was played over 40 boards ? four segments of 10 each. In the first segment 76 imps were exchanged. The Parfait team was only 10 imps in arrears after this segment but fell away in the next segment when two slam hands went the opposite way to what they considered desirable.
In the first of these both South's were presented with the same high-level bidding decision. Look only at the South hand shown below. What call would you make after the followingauction?
WESTNORTHEASTSOUTH 1D2S5D??? The Parfait South bid 5H and is rapidly gaining the reputation of a Ted Chadwick Victorian (refer to his articles in Australian Bridge magazine if you fail to understand the meaning ? or should I say, demeaning). Bob Richman bid 6H ? 13 imps to the Rothfield team.
On the other slam deal West, Seamus Browne opened 4H in first position with 12 points and a 6-4 hand. This pre-emptive action made it difficult for the Parfait North/South to get a good result on the board. They pushed on to 6S and were defeated by one trick when the defence was perfect. At the other table no such pre-empt gave Rothfield an easy ride to 4S ? another 13 imps away. It was difficult to recover from these setbacks and eventually the Parfait team was just beaten 153-72.
In the final of the NOT the Noble team of Barry Noble, Terry Brown, Phil Gue, George Bilski and Andrew Peake defeated the Burgess team 239-149.
NORTH ; A975432 k T95 l Q2 ' 9 WEST ; QT86 k K6 l AK543 ' T6 EAST ; J k 84 l JT9876 ' KJ87 SOUTH ; K k AQJ732 l VOID ' AQ5432
© 1999 Newcastle Herald