Occult Bridge

Sick of playing those same old mortal opponents you get at your local bridge club? The folks in Mollo’s Menagerie had the spicy experience one Walpurgis Night (go on, look it up!) of playing against the Prince of Darkness and his consort, who had taken the assumed names of Lord and Lady Greymalkin (Destiny at Bay, chapter thirteen). Here’s my favourite hand, where the demonic duo get the better of perennial lovable muppets Timothy the Toucan, and the original Rueful Rabbit:

	♠ T86 ♥ 9 ♦ 98765432 ♣ 9
♠ KJ97 ♥ 8 ♦ AK ♣ AKQ864		♠ AQ ♥ AKQJ753 ♦ QJT ♣ T
	♠ 5432 ♥ T642 ♦ ♣ J7532

The Rabbit and Toucan bid the East-West hands to the unassailable 7H, and excitedly showed each other their cards. Unfortunately, they had forgotten to wait till the bidding was over, meaning that all twenty six cards they held were now major penalty cards. South could now bid 7NT, and, since Law 50 allowed him to choose the cards the opponents played, this ludicrous contract romped home on a combined 1-count! I’ll leave it to you to work out the best sequence of play to ensure thirteen tricks.

But then, if you want to play occult bridge, there’s no need to wait for the Father of Lies to cut into your club game. The Bridge to Nowhere team includes our very own Necromancer, a notorious psychic bidder, who is adept at conjuring up the spirits of hands long since dead and bidding them in place of the thirteen cards he actually holds. (Thirteen cards? No wonder there’s a home for the occult in our game!) Now let’s be clear, though, what the Necromancer’s goals are, and what makes a good psyche. Our psychic pscientist once saw a junior pick up the following, third in hand, non vulnerable against vulnerable:

♠ 32 ♥ 974 ♦ A84 ♣ JT872

After two passes, would you ever open 1C? The Necromancer disapproves. Meddling in the spirit world is a risky undertaking, and the ghouls who inhabit the dark beyond play cruel tricks on those who interfere without fixed purpose in mind. You’re not eating any bidding space, you’re not directing a helpful lead from partner (do you really want him to lead from K-x in that suit?), and you’re not even picking off a suit where the opponents are likely to have a fit. This pitiable effort met with just punishment: for of course partner had a maximum pass, and of course he responded 2NT, and there are few forms of scoring where -200 on a partscore deal leads to a good result.

No, our Necromancer, instructor in the dark arts, has convinced us that the forces of the underworld will only side with our efforts when we have some evil, sinister purpose in mind. A psyche has a chance of succeeding when it can meet two objectives. Firstly, it has to envision an action from the opponents that will lead to their winning the board – finding a slam, or the right game, or getting off to the right lead against our best contract. And next, it must create an illusion, a diversion, that draws the opponents away from that successful action and leads them to their doom. It’s much like tempting someone to sell his soul – you have to offer in exchange a prospect that appears enticing at first sight, but only reveals itself to be smoke and mirrors when it’s already too late.

Here’s an example of how the Necromancer enlists the psychic forces of the Dark Beyond, from the Brighton Congress teams this past summer:

♠ AQ874 ♥ KQJ732 ♦ ♣ 32

Holding the above cards, the Necromancer opened 1H first in hand, and was gratified to hear a 1S response from partner. What would your next bid be? 4S seems to sell the hand short, when as little as ten-fourth of spades and the ace-queen of clubs opposite would give a decent play for slam, but what is the best way to try for six? A 4D splinter would convey the diamond shortness, though would not get across the potential of that beautiful heart side suit, and would probably imply better clubs. The Necromancer also had a 5D bid available (Voidwood, or Exclusion Blackwood) which would ask for keycards outside the diamond suit, suggesting a diamond void, and would at least have the merit of avoiding a hopeless contract whenever the opponents could cash two aces on lead. What do you think the Necromancer did?

Rejecting all of the above bids, he tried for outright larceny, and bid 5C(!), showing a void in clubs, and asking for keycards outside the club suit. Partner duly showed two without the queen of trumps, and shortly found himself in 6 spades. Turn now to St Jude (for it was he) in the East seat, and try to find an opening lead:

♠ T3 ♥ A9 ♦ T875 ♣ AK954

Obviously on the auction the club lead looked like one of Jude’s trademark Lost Causes, since not only would it be ruffed in the dummy, it might also allow declarer to take a ruffing finesse in clubs for a critical discard later in the play. Jude settled on a diamond, as dummy looked to have a few high cards in diamonds on the auction, and partner might have the offside king to establish before declarer could set up the hearts to get rid of his losers in that suit.

Partner did indeed come up with the king of diamonds, but to no avail, for this was the full deal:

Dealer S Vul All Scoring Imp Lead ♦5	♠ KJ92 ♥ 854 ♦ AQ43 ♣ J865
♠ 65 ♥ T6 ♦ KJ962 ♣ QT76		♠ T3 ♥ A9 ♦ T875 ♣ AK954
	♠ AQ874 ♥ KQJ732 ♦ ♣ 32

With both dummy’s clubs going off on the diamonds, twelve tricks were now trivial for declarer, thanks to the Necromancer’s incantations. And who can say he didn’t deserve his luck? He imagined a hand where God intended that slam should go off, and with the assistance of the psychic world thwarted the best efforts of His humble agent St Jude once again. Good versus evil... the battle that began in the Griffins’ club among the Mollo menagerie continues at the card table to this day, and will not reach its resolution until the day the Angel Gabriel draws the Last Trump.

Chuck Norris and bridge

Bridge to Nowhere likes to keep abreast of the memes and fads which sweep the Internet, and like bridge players everywhere, is always within a couple of years of the latest fashions. In this spirit we present our list of Chuck Norris Facts: If Chuck Norris Played Bridge...

• Do not pull Chuck Norris’ penalty doubles. This is your only warning.


• General rule of defence: Lead through Chuck Norris, and up to weakness.


• When other partners overcall, and you don’t lead their suit, you lose the post mortem. When Chuck Norris overcalls, and you don’t lead his suit, you ARE the post mortem.


• Chuck Norris does not bid one more when he is in doubt. Chuck Norris is never in doubt.


• When Chuck Norris decides to play for the drop, he can bring down a doubleton king.


• Chuck Norris’ LHO opens 1D. Chuck Norris’ partner overcalls 1H. Chuck Norris’ RHO bids 1S. Chuck Norris bids 1C. This is a sufficient bid.


• There are no redouble cards in Chuck Norris’ bidding box. This is because no one dares double him.


• Chuck Norris does not play Weak Twos. Chuck Norris cannot possess a weakness.


• Chuck Norris once made a grand slam that was missing the Ace and King of trumps. No-one revoked.


• The five level belongs to Chuck Norris.
  
• Chuck Norris does not play the Weak No Trump. If you don’t know why, you are sadly under-informed about Chuck Norris.


• Contrary to popular belief, Chuck Norris is not an expert at reading opponents’ cards. The cards just make it their business to be where Chuck Norris wants them to be.


• Chuck Norris just executed a simultaneous double squeeze. On your sister and your mother.


• When Chuck Norris holds AQT8, he counts four top tricks.


• Who would win if the Italian Blue Team could play the Culbertson team that won the ‘Bridge Battle of the Century’? Answer: Chuck Norris.


• Chuck Norris does not make slam. Slam makes Chuck Norris.

Next post: some topical musings on the sinking of the Titanic...

Why should we shuffle before returning hands to the board?

Bridge is a thinker’s game, and no thinker delves more deeply into the minds of his fellow players than Sigmund, Professor of Creative Bidding and academic consultant to the Bridge to Nowhere team. You, dear reader, no doubt consider yourself a Master Player, not only because you’ve attended the Holmes Wilson for the last thirty years straight and have managed to scrape together enough 15-15 draws for the required national points, but also because, in all those years, you have acquired a modest amount of fluency in remembering the bidding and play at your own table, at least while the board is still in progress. You still have some way to go, however, before you match the feats of Professor Sigmund, who is capable of reconstructing what happened on a board that has already been played two tables back!

Here’s the scenario. Pairs tournament, of mixed ability. It’s towards the middle of the competition, and Sigmund is doing reasonably well, despite a couple of characteristic slips. His boards are coming from the sitout; he returns to the table after slipping out for a cigar (just a cigar, nothing else), greets his new opponents (“How’s your mother?”), and picks up the following cards.

Board 19
South dealer, E-W vulnerable

♠ KQJT8 ♥ T4 ♦ KQ5 ♣ T42

Would you open this hand, first and green? It depends on your style. If you like going off in game, or letting through a cold 4H, doubled by partner, then by all means reach for the 1S card. If you’re playing Precision or Polish Club or Carrot Club or some other system where openings are limited to 16 HCP, you’re probably reasonably safe; partner’s not going to hang you for opening this aceless rubbish, and at least you’ve bought a favourable lead. But if you play the system you learned at your mother’s knee, some kind of Acol-type Weak & 4, surely pass is clear. Should you declare the hand, you’re at the mercy of your opponents in the early play, since you don’t have any controls: the tempo on this hand belongs to the enemy. Plus you have a very nice spade overcall available on a later round of the auction, which both describes your hand and also has some values to spare. That’s not the case with an Acol 1S opening, which shows 12-20 (yes, twelve to twenty), and compels you to make minimum rebids on the next seven rounds of the auction as parter repeatedly forces the bidding, plenty of time to repent of your folly in opening a hand with too many faces, not enough aces.

That’s how Sigmund saw the hand, and he was about to toss the green Pass card on the table, when a detail suddenly seized his attention. After he had pulled the cards from the board and counted them out 1 to 13, he had inspected their faces, and they were already sorted for him! For sure, the Laws technically require a shuffle before returning the cards to the board; but this is Ireland, the Wild West of contract bridge, where the Laws mean nothing if the sheriff has no gun, and it is routine here for players to cock a snook at the authorities by returning cards unshuffled. Why were these cards in perfect order, spades-hearts-diamonds-clubs, sorted top to bottom? Because that was how the previous South had sorted them before he returned them to the board! And had he really played all 13 cards in this highly improbably order of highest-to-lowest, spades-to-clubs? Surely not. No doubt the hand was passed out, because the points were distributed evenly as 9 or 10 or 11 between the four hands, all of which were fairly flat; and that meant that Sigmund, who held a very appealing holding in the boss suit, could bid 2S, notionally weak (Benjamin style), confident that no-one had the values to come in at the 3 level, and confident of finding at least a partially-fitting dummy with plenty of working values, but not enough to make missing game a danger!

As expected, 2S was passed out, with no-one having the values to proceed further. The full hand was as follows, with 2S cold against a passout at most other tables: +110 and a near top.

Dealer S Vul E/W Scoring MP Lead ♣9	♠ 94 ♥ 862 ♦ AJT62 ♣ KQ7
♠ A32 ♥ AQ753 ♦ 93 ♣ 985		♠ 765 ♥ KJ9 ♦ 874 ♣ AJ63
	♠ KQJT8 ♥ T4 ♦ KQ5 ♣ T42

(9 of clubs led, followed by three rounds of hearts, on the last of which the Professor discarded a spade from hand, playing safe against a possible 4-2 spade split, followed by ace-other spade exit.)

Undeserved reward for the actions of a psycho? Analytical brilliance? Your judgement, dear reader, but if you begrudge Sigmund his fine score on this board, there is one favour you could do us all: Please, please, please, shuffle your cards before you return them to the wallet!