A practice match of the Dutch Open Team at the Onstein Castle, May 24-26 1996, against Poland and the USA. Onstein is the residence of Hans Melchers, big fan of the Dutch team. Thanks to the support of Melchers the selection is able to follow a very intensive training program, including these tough practice matches.
Zia must have thought he arrived in heaven, when he first sat down for
the match against the Dutch team at Onstein. Now this castle is really
an unbelievable heavenly place to stay, but it got even better when at
the first board his partner Michael Rosenberg balanced after 1
- 2 by his opponents with 3
and got doubled. When Zia tabled his dummy, containing Axxx of trumps and
a void in a side suit, he said with a broad smile "Welcome to Holland,
Michael". Of course ten tricks were easy.
And later on Rosenberg opened 1
,
Zia 2
, Rosenberg 2,
and Zia went on to 6. Van Cleeff,
holding AKJx, had his
suspicions about the 2 bid,
but he didn't double. Wrong. Dummy contained QT
bare...
So Zia drew first blood for the Americans in style. But revenge was on its way...
First we invite you to take a seat at the table. Jan van Cleeff desperately
needs a drink, so he asks you to play a hand for him. Of course you accept,
and a few moments later you find yourself facing Jan Jansma, with on your
left a Pakistani Playboy, and on your right a Scottish Scatterbrain. You
wonder which of the two is the famous Zia, but you have no time to ask,
since RHO opens 4. You pick
up your hand: 75 75 AK42 KJ654.
You don't feel the need to prove something, so you pass. After two more
passes, you are on lead. That is easy: A.
Dummy comes down:
| T3 |
|
| KQ4 |
|
| Q9765 |
|
| AT2 |
|
| 75 |
|
| 75 |
|
| AK42 |
|
| KJ654 |
8 and
declarer 3. Rosenberg
asks about your carding. "Upside down" volunteers Jansma quickly. Time
to write history. What is your plan now?
The Dutch team for the Rhodos Olympiad has been trained these past few months by Krystof Martens of Poland. The selection consists of four pairs. Four players of the 'Santiago Six' Bermuda Bowl winners were an easy choice: Piet Jansen & Jan Westerhof and Wubbo de Boer & Bauke Muller. And by consistent excellent results at the national level two other pairs earned their place in the selection: Jaap van der Neut & Gert-Jan Paulissen and Jan van Cleeff & Jan Jansma. In October one of these pairs has to be content with the role of substitute...
You miss the names of the best Dutch pair of the past few years: Enri Leufkens and Berry Westra. The good news for Enri Leufkens is that he will be father of his second child soon. The bad news for Berry Westra and Dutch bridge in general is that he took a sabbatical year, at least from his bridge activities, to spend more time with his family.
Eight international top players were lucky enough to be invited to stay at Onstein and play some cards against the Dutchies. You already saw the names of Michael Rosenberg and Zia Mahmood. Ravindra Murthy and Debbie Zuckerberg completed the American team. Especially Murthy showed some impressive bridge during the matches. Trainer Martens had three friends over from Poland: Szymanovski, Kowalski and Romanski.
Back to business. Sunday brought the second match between IMP editor Jan van Cleeff and the Pakistan magician. Again Zia got off a decent start, so he announced loudly that the losers of the match would be sent to Onstein's hunting grounds after which Hans Melchers, an excellent hunter, would go after them with his double-barrelled shotgun. Of course Van Cleeff protested strongly, but Zia added that Melchers especially liked big and slow targets.
And that set the stage for a great show:
An amused but provoked Van Cleeff, a cheerful Zia, a giggling Jansma,
and Rosenberg quiet as ever. And fate brought us four spectacular deals
in a row....
![[diagram]](spel0060.gif)
A simple 4 for EW, you would
think. Not in Zia style, however:
| West | North | East | South |
|---|---|---|---|
| Jansma | Rosenberg | Van Cleeff | Zia |
| - | - | - | 1 |
| 1 |
dbl | 4 |
pass |
| pass | dbl | rdbl | 4 |
| dbl | pass | pass | pass |
.
After a prompt redouble, Zia escaped to 4.
That was very silly of him, because he went 1100 down, whereas 4
redoubled would have been only 1080.
And Van Cleeff got a taste for redoubling. The next board:
![[diagram]](spel0061.gif)
| West | North | East | South |
|---|---|---|---|
| Jansma | Rosenberg | Van Cleeff | Zia |
| 1 |
pass | 1NT | pass |
| 4 |
dbl | rdbl | pass |
| pass | pass |
again. Rosenberg led Q
and was not charmed of the 10
in dummy, but the club suit provided discards in time anyway. Another 1080
for Jan & Jan. And Zia asked Hans Melchers if he could borrow some
running shoes...
The next board (the boards were shared by four tables, so they were not played in order) could have brought a new world record: three consecutive succesful redoubles against Zia!
![[diagram]](spel0062.gif)
| West | North | East | South |
|---|---|---|---|
| Jansma | Rosenberg | Van Cleeff | Zia |
| - | - | 1NT | pass |
| 2 |
dbl | rdbl | pass |
| 3NT | pass | pass | pass |
led to the inevitable redouble by Van Cleeff. Had Jansma passed this and
made an overtrick (as he said he would have, but this requires some good
declarer play) he would have scored 1160 and that would have been a unique
series of three consecutive succesful redoubles against Zia Mahmood, resulting
in 1100, 1080 and 1160! But when Van Cleeff heard a lot of chicken noises
(by Jansma himself!) at the other side of the screen, he knew that his
partner had bid 3NT.
In the meantime Michael Rosenberg was mildly amused, and he really needed to score some points:
![[diagram]](spel0063.gif)
| West | North | East | South |
|---|---|---|---|
| Jansma | Rosenberg | Van Cleeff | Zia |
| - | 4 |
pass | pass |
| pass |
A
lead, probably too difficult single-dummy. Jan van Cleeff realized that
he needed heart or club tricks, so he switched to 7,
after which partner should work out whether to continue hearts or switch
to clubs. This was not good enough, because now a discard on the Q
came available to Rosenberg. Jansma saw that switching clubs didn't help
now, because then Rosenberg could throw his diamond on the Q
after winning A, losing
only one club after that. So Jansma led back a diamond, and the hand was
over. Also a heart or spade switch gives declarer time enough to set up
the diamonds with A as
entry. So, the contract is always made after the lead of A?
No. It is clear that defense needs a club trick before the diamonds
are set up. But crossing to partner to lead a club gives up the tempo,
as we saw in practice. Thus partner needs to have the Q
to defeat the contract? No. A Merrimac coup is the solution to this beautiful
problem.
East should return K
at trick two, and then even Michael Rosenberg is helpless!
Holland won both matches. The cross-imp classification read as follows:
| 1. | Romanski - Kowalski | 184 |
| 2. | Jansma - Van Cleeff | 98 |
| 3. | Mahmood - Rosenberg | 90 |
| 4. | Van der Neut - Paulissen | 55 |
| 5. | Jansen - Westerhof | 35 |
| 6. | De Boer - Muller | 7 |
| 7. | Martens - Szymanovski | -159 |
| 8. | Zuckerberg - Murthy | -310 |
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