Dubious Logic

Spring Fours - Sponsors

Though my sporting interests are catholic I seldom read the golf pages in the newspapers but my eye caught an article about the impending phenomenon that is the American teenager Michelle Wei. The money men that dominate the game in organisation, sponsorship and equipment are tiptoeing around the Hawaiian teenager, conscious of not offending the sport's traditional relationship with the amateur yet not wanting to miss out on her inevitable move to professionalism. And, over the weekend, your eye couldn't help notice the logos and visible endorsements as the World Snooker Championships drew to a finale. However, I was at the Schapiro Spring Fours; Britain's single event teams championship run by the English Bridge Union.

Bridge lacks anything so obvious but it too is gradually embracing this fact of life in the twenty first century. The Spring Fours has received sponsorship in recent years – this is the second – thanks to a legacy from the great Boris Schapiro (who unceremoniously put my team out of the same competition some years back) but it isn't that aspect of the event I'm considering in the same light as golf and snooker. Increasingly these days, following the model in the United States, prestigious tournaments are contested by sponsored teams. The form is that a wealthy individual funds either expert partners, team-mates or both and tries to win the top competitions.

Over the May Day weekend, each of the top nine seeded teams included at least one sponsor. Is this good for bridge? Well, certainly the field was incredibly strong; there were Swedes, Dutch, Bulgarians and a sizeable contingent of Norwegians – all components of their national teams - and a famous Pakistani as well. Naturally the English and Scottish squads were well represented and the juniors too. So, for the quality of the game, I have to say, I think it is.

But buying a team certainly isn't the only way to improve your game – this is a textbook example of controlling the play when setting up a long suit:

You arrive in 4♠ from the West side after North has overcalled in diamonds; he leads a heart. It is natural to draw some trumps but you require some for communication and potentially, ruffing out the club suit. You can probably afford one of the black suits to break 4-1 but if it is going to be clubs, you'd better not get the club ace ruffed if at all possible. So first thing to do is cash a top club so the next lead can come from dummy. Then two spades, ace and queen, when both follow and you next lead a club and South shows out, you should reflect that you are not going to be able to ruff all the clubs good and duck a trick.

That way, even if North plays a diamond and the king surprisingly loses to the ace and you have to ruff, you can ruff a club high, come to hand drawing the last trump and claim an overtrick. At the other table West tried to cash both top clubs and got one ruffed. A deceptive heart ten was played through the knave and declarer, East this time, ran it to the closed hand. Obviously having something of a different view of the cards, he ruffed a diamond to dummy and tried the heart knave – hoping to pin the heart nine perhaps. When this lost to the queen he was struggling to make enough tricks and found himself one adrift.

2005 Schapiro Spring Fours
Final: Wolfarth (G. Wolfarth / B. Senior, V. Kovachev / V. Isporski) beat Goldenfield (R. Goldenfield / M. Brunner, B. Goldenfield / J. Smith) 79-66 IMPs

2005 Punch Bowl (secondary event)
Richter (B. Richter / M. James, J. Green [Suffolk] / G. Hazel)

Published Saturday 7.May.2005