In the Dec issue of the ACBL Bulletin a letter writer, Bob Chambers, took exception to the statement by Joel Wooldridge that ‘matchpoint scoring is not real bridge.’ Bob pointed out the many technical challenges that a matchpoint game presents, in particular the need to play to the hilt in order to maximize the score on each and every hand. Conceptually this is true enough, but matchpoint players do very well by bidding towards the middle of the field and taking their tops where they come, either through clever play or gifts from the opponents. It’s the scoring that Wooldridge refers to, and I think he is wrong on that point as well. At matchpoints it is up to the individual whether or not he wishes to follow the field and bid like a dozo.
At IMPs one can get lazy and toss away overtricks without much concern. Recently I misdefended against 3NT, making 520, which was a tie board. My partner and I bid to 6♣, making 940, losing 1 IMP to the pair in 6♥. The punishment for declaring in clubs and missing this cold Grand Slam was a pittance. It would have scored a deserved zero at matchpoints. There are rewards for bad bidding. Over 28 boards my partner and I bid 3NT on 5 occasions, going down 3 times, but gaining 9 IMPs overall, because one of the games lucked through. At matchpoints these terrible bids would receive scant reward.
Recently my Precision partner and I achieved a score of 70%, which clearly represents a miracle by Enrico Fermi’s statistical standard. As we were the only Precision players in the field, one can claim that we were bidding against the field on many hands, even though we never opened with our strong 1♣ bid. We played in 3NT 3 times, achieving a score of 34 out of 36 without the benefit of an overtrick. I put this down largely to superior bidding methods, not to wild gambling such as we encounter in Teams. Of course the advantages of 3NT are ever present. We defended 3NT 6 times and achieved a 55% average on those boards, thanks largely to one occasion when the contract was set 7 tricks for the rare score of 700 when declarer tried frantically to make 9 tricks.
The strategy in a matchpoint game is like the strategy of a major league baseball team trying to make the playoffs – tie on the road (when defending), win big at home (when declaring). One won’t score many tops against the good pairs, so we have to make up ground against the others. Against the 4 best pairs in the field, we scored a miserable 44% over 8 boards, but against the lesser lights we did exceedingly well. One may talk disparagingly about ‘gifts’, but errors are a part of the game. One must be in a position to score well against the errors that inevitably occur, which means one must push to the limit on every hand possible, especially against the weaker pairs against whom an average result is tantamount to falling behind the field.
Many players think they are playing at IMPs where a penalty double of a partial is all but unheard of. We scored 45 out of 48 matchpoints by doubling part scores: 1♥, 3♣, 3♥ and 4♣. At Teams we wouldn’t double any of these, and the results would have been insignificant on the Victory Point scale. Of course there were risks, but when we push to the limit and beyond we have put ourselves in the position of maximizing the gain when we are right. This is one of the weaknesses of IMP scoring – there is little punishment for overbidding outrageously. The most interesting matchpoint double came on the following combination and it didn’t depend on an overbid for its success.
My reasoning may have been faulty but it worked. My book bid is 2NT, going down 1. Even an underbid 1NT doesn’t look profitable as it won’t score well on the marked heart lead. As partner might have balanced with 1♠or 1NT, we can assume declarer’s points lie largely in the heart suit, leaving partner with stuff in the minors. Playing to put declarer down 1 is especially risky, but as the opponents are vulnerable +200 would be a great score for us. So it transpired: declarer had 6 tricks off the top and we had 7. It would have been a bottom for us if declarer’s shape had been a more suitable 3=5=3=2 instead of 3=5=2=3. However, one zero is tolerable, and we would still have scored 70% out of our 4 doubles of part scores. Partner was understandably perturbed by my pass, but we can only hope this doesn’t deter him from balancing doubles in the future.
It is worth noting that the division of sides was 8-7-6-5 with a Total Trump count of 16, a exact predictor of the Total Tricks available. If partner had had 1 more club and 1 less diamond the division of sided would be 7=7=7=5, a Total Trump count of 15, but declarer would make 7 tricks unless we were smart enough to cash 2 top clubs before attempting a trump promotion on the 4th spade – not an easy defence – impossible after my trump lead. I think this illustrates the excitement one may create in a matchpoint game. The requirement is there for accurate play and defence that would not be a factor at Teams, where I would be obliged to grope for a game just in case one of them was making. (In fact, a Moyesian 4♠could come home, but no pair achieved that result.)
The Adventure of the Four Nines
There is no great merit in playing to avoid disaster. It is akin to converting your paper money to gold coins and burying them in the backyard, as Samuel Pepys did during The Great Fire of 1666. Very often at Teams one declares a hand in a plodding fashion which appears to represent the safest route to making a contract. Here is an example of a hand that was turned into an exciting adventure, not always the best approach.
After partner’s 1♦ overcall, which promises good value, I explored alternative contracts with a cue bid of 2♣, not guaranteeing a fit with diamonds. The jump to 3♦ was unwelcome, and I was endplayed into bidding the ubiquitous 3NT. When the dummy appeared I noted the absence of the ♦9, the curse of Scotland. Not being superstitious and keeping in mind that at matchpoints one should play for as many tricks as may be made on a good day, I planned to set up the diamonds. I had the entries.
At Teams I should ignore the scant possibility of setting up diamond tricks and play to make 3 tricks in spades – win the ♣A and overtake the ♠9 and plug away expecting to have an entry both in clubs and hearts. Boring! At Matchpoints I put in the ♣9 hoping that would provide an additional entry to dummy from which to play a low diamond towards the hidden hand. No such luck as the ♣9 was covered by the ♣T and my ♣Q. Maybe the ♣7 would provide some protection.
The next step was the lead a diamond towards dummy hoping to drop the ♦9 in 2 rounds. The quick appearance of the ♦K gave me pause. I ducked and a club put me back in dummy. I played the ♦A pitching a spade, but the ♥9, not the ♦9, made its unexpected appearance on my left. Interesting card. The bad news was that the RHO had diamonds to cash, but hopefully with no entry. So now we had to revert to overtaking the ♠9 and hoping for some help from the LHO who seemed to have all the opposition’s points outside diamonds. Here is the full deal.
Here was the position when South took the first spade.
South, who scored 50% on the session, went for the quick kill by cashing the ♣K hoping to drop the ♣J from either hidden hand. The uninformative cuebid added to the confusion as I might have been dealt a 5=4=1=3 hand. When that failed she found she had endplayed herself. If she had exited a heart I would have played 3 rounds ending in my hand before playing another spade. The play of the hand had turned into an adventure akin to Around the World in Eighty Days full of misadventures and suspense but with a happy ending albeit one lacking the bracing presence of Shirley Maclaine.
There are 2 points to make. If I had played safely from the start I would have achieved the same top score that required a defensive error and a double thrown-in. With half the field in 3NT it had appeared initially that overtricks were important. Not so. This was a difficult hand to play, so being competently careful would have been enough. Secondly, resting in 3♦ making 130 would have scored 80%, so there was no need for heroics. One needn’t imitate the field in its errant ways. It’s like the stock market: by getting it right one profits when the market is going down as well as when it is going up. Proper hand evaluation is the key, and bidding solely according to HCP is not it, but when all’s said and done the contract was fun to play, which is what counts most.
When compared to Matchpoints Team equals Tame. One must be careful if for no other reason than consideration for one’s teammates. Bidding with abandon without fear of punishment, never doubling contracts on the off-chance they might make, playing as safely as possible in anticipation of bad breaks, avoiding good slams, all these practices make for a boring game. A long match against experts can be a good test in which psychology plays a part, but a matchpoint game against variable opponents requires a finer judgement that varies with the circumstances. Hooray for Matchpoints.
What Happens When We Increase the Retirement Age
Announcement: Passengers are reminded for their own comfort and safety to speak loudly and clearly when addressing the cabin crew.
Passenger: Steward, please bring me a bottle of plain, distilled water.
Steward: Another? You must be part camel! Say, aren’t you Doris Day?
Passenger: Ma’am, I’d like a tuna salad sandwich on half-rye, no pickle.
Stewardess: Fine, but go and wash your hands first, young man.
Stewart: Nancy, how about you and me getting together after we land?
Stewardess: Thanks, Larry, but I got to baby-sit my granddaughter’s kids.
Pilot to Co-Pilot: Remind me again, what’s our destination?
Co-Pilot: Hold on, I wrote it down someplace.