Bridge Blog 1179: Shine on, Danny Diamond

 

Good spirits abounded Monday at Bridge Centre of Niagara in St. Catharines, Ont. It was a full house –  9½ tables for the open game in the main room, nine tables for the 499er contest in the smaller area. Plus there was a celebration for one of the regular players, Danny Ioannidis, who just reached 5,000 master points and became a Diamond Life Master, quite a few of those points at BCON.

In the remarks congratulating him, we found out a few things that we might not have learned at the tables. For instance, his ancestry is not Greek, it's Macedonian (a very important distinction there). Also he's a retired teacher – high school math and then art for the lower grades in the Brampton, Ont., schools, even though he knew nothing about art when he started teaching it. And then there was something we suspected all along, that he's a very good partner, as attested by his frequent collaborator, Jane Jennings (pictured). Not only does he play well, she said, but he's a nice guy.

When Monday's play finished 27 boards later, Danny had another 1.69 points for his collection, his 58.86% good for second place North-South. He was well ahead of me and Selina Volpatti, sitting in eighth place at 45.57%. To win something in the B strat, we needed 15 more match points to outdistance Muriel Tremblay and Kathy Morrison's 52.55%. To surpass Danny and his partner, Laiqing Luo, it would take twice as many.

Given some luck, we could catch up. On Board 1, Danny and partner had a top score when his opponents didn't go to game in Spades. Ours did. That accounts for seven of those match points.

On Board 3, he got a 7 match point gift when his opponents let him play and make 3 No Trump, while ours pushed us to 5 Clubs doubled, down one. If we let East-West win the bidding at 4 Hearts, they go down one or more.

On Board 5, however, they recognized this 6 Diamond slam for another 7 match point advantage, while I only bid 5 Clubs and made an overtrick. All the other North-Souths stopped at 3 NT, with at least one overtrick, and got better scores.

South

Spades: 6

Hearts: 10.

Diamonds: J-10-6-5-4.

Clubs: A-K-9-8-6-5.

North

Spades: J-9-7-5.

Hearts: A-J-3.

Diamonds: A-K-Q.

Clubs: Q-10-3.