2024 Victor Champion Cup
The Victor Champion Cup is one of the major events in the Australian Bridge calendar. It runs over the June long weekend in Melbourne. Two days of pairs events followed by three days of Swiss teams. No final, you finish on top, you win. The nice thing for those travelling is that the event finishes in the early afternoon on the Monday so that you can catch a plane home. It’s a strong field with many of Australia’s top players turning up.
Pairs
Andy Hung, our bridge professional and teacher, played with Jessica Brake in the Wally Scott Open Swiss Pairs and came second.
Teams
In the Swiss Teams Andy played with Sartaj Hans. Their teammates were David Beauchamp and Gabby Feiler. Heading into the final match Andy’s team was running second and about to play the leaders (Coutts) and number one seeds. The number two seeds (Haffer) were also near the top and only just behind Andy’s team.
A big win in the last match saw Andy’s team leap past Coutts with just enough to stay ahead of Haffer. A great win. Well done to Andy and his teammates.
Your office manager and correspondent was also there for the Swiss Teams (Pauline Collett - Martin Doran, Alan Cransberg - Kimberley Zhao) finishing 19th of 74 and the best placed West Australian team.
Sometimes you need to be lucky
A light opening in second seat by South got North excited. Despite the overcall by West and looking at a flat hand, North decided to push over South’s four spade bid and check for keycards. finding South with two keycards and the queen North bid slam that was understandably only reached by six of the seventy four pairs.
Can you see a chance for twelve tricks on a low heart lead?
It’s not immediately obvious but if West has both the Queen and Jack of diamonds then you can you can take four diamond tricks and get rid of one of your two losing clubs. Just lead a diamond towards dummy intending to play the ten or lead the nine intending to run it. Making 6 spade tricks, four diamonds, one heart and one club gives you twelve altogether. It’s approximately a 25% chance. Certainly better than nothing.