2013 Teltscher Trophy - after the event

The England Seniors failed to hold on to their overnight lead on the last day of Teltscher Trophy in Cardiff. A heavy defeat against Northern Ireland brought us back into the pack and, although we still had a chance with one match to go, we needed a big win and for other results to go our way. It was not to be - Scotland surged past Northern Ireland to win the event, leaving England in third place.

At the final dinner it was announced that the event will henceforth be known only as the Teltscher Trophy and it should not be referred to as the Senior Camrose. It is now an established event in its own right, very popular with the players and (fiercely) played in a great spirit.

2013 Teltscher Trophy - Sunday morning

The first complete round-robin has been played, and the first match of the second round robin, so six matches down and four to go. So far England have won three, drawn one and lost two, and we find ourselves in the lead with 102 VPs, ahead of three teams on 88 and one on 87.

The deals have been exciting - the same team playing in 2D in both rooms, trumps seemingly breaking 5-0 more often than 3-2, a bidding sequence of 2D - 7D (bid and made against England) and so on. Maybe we will have nice boring part score deals today so that we can stay ahead of the chasing pack.

Many thanks to Roger O'Shea and Pharon Independent Financial Advisers, who are sponsoring the England Senior team.

Tune in and watch us on BBO this afternoon ... much more exciting than the football and, if you are interested in cricket, you can have Test Match Special on in the background.

2013 Teltscher Trophy

The Senior Home Internationals for the Teltscher Trophy (sometimes referred to as the Senior Camrose) was first held in 2008. The competition for the trophy is between the four home nations and the Republic of Ireland. The event has been generously sponsored since its inception by Bernard Teltscher, who leads the Great Britain team that brings the number of teams up to six. The Patron’s team can come first, but it cannot win the trophy.

The event is played over a single weekend with a double round robin of 14-board matches. England has won the trophy twice, in 2008 in Oxford and in 2012 in Ayr. Wales has won once and Scotland has won twice, cannily finishing second in the two years that the Great Britain came first.

England is represented by the very experienced team that won the trials last December. Paul Hackett, who has won the trophy twice in four appearances, is partnering David Mossop, playing in the event for first time, having returned to England after a number of years playing in and for Switzerland.

Gunnar Hallberg and John Holland are playing together in a Teltscher Trophy team for the fourth time; three times for England (two wins) and once for Great Britain (a win but no trophy).

David Price and Colin Simpson have also played together for England (once) and for Great Britain (twice, one win). David and Colin were part of the England team that won the Camrose earlier in 2013 and they hope (tempting fate, this bit) to become the first pair to win the Camrose and Teltscher Trophy in the same year.

I have the honour of NPCing the England team and I have supplied each of them with a diet sheet, a fitness programme, and a detailed guide (with examples) of how to tell when a 4♣ bid is Gerber. You can do your bit by watching the match on BBO with your fingers crossed; with your help England can do the Camrose - Lady Milne - Teltscher Trophy treble in 2013.

2013 Lady Milne

The Lady Milne started in 1934 as the Ladies Team championship of the NBA (National Bridge Association), which was run by Hubert Phillips. Lady Milne was assistant secretary to the NBA. In 1950 the Lady Milne became the trophy for the Ladies Home Internationals, and was won by Scotland.

The event is played over a single weekend for women’s teams from England, Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland (who rejoined the event in 1998). A sixth team was introduced in 2009, in Limerick, to balance the numbers; the host country providing two teams. The EBU team (the pairs who came 4^th, 5^th and 6^th in the trials) won the event in Manchester in 2010.

In the 62 series so far, England/EBU has won outright on 46 occasions. Scotland have won 11 times, Wales three times and Northern Ireland twice. In addition England and Scotland tied for first place in 2011 (and the regulations have been changed so that it won’t happen again).

The teams will play 32 boards (two sets of 16) against each other team. Scotland, going for three wins in a row and with the home-crowd urging them on, are probably the team to beat. Their team includes the ever-green Liz McGowan (seven times a Lady Milne winner, first in 1986). England start against Northern Ireland on Friday evening and play Scotland on Sunday morning.

England are represented by five past winners and one debutante. Sally Brock has won the Lady Milne six times, her first win coming in 1976. Her latest two wins, in 2010 and 2011, were in partnership with Susanna Gross. Gillian Fawcett is a five-time winner (1989 to 2003), and is playing with Jane Moore, who has won three times (1993 to 2000). Lizzie Godfrey has also won three times (1997 to 2011). Her partner is Pauline Cohen, who is winning her first cap. The Lady Milne team is being NPCed by Simon Cope for the third time. He led the England team to victory in 2010 and 2011, and he was also NPC of the Camrose team that won the event in March. Let us hope that these are good omens!

Invitation Events

One of the Selection Committee's responsibilities is selecting and supporting teams for invitation events.

From time to time an overseas bridge organisation will invite us to send a representative team to one of their events. These events are an important source of practice for our international players when preparing for World and European championships, and an opportunity for aspiring players to gain experience and to demonstrate that they can perform at the highest levels.

Sometimes the organisers will provide a subsidy in the form of free entry, accommodation or a contribution to expenses. The Selection Committee may also provide some funding, depending on the event and on the team selected.

When selecting teams for these events, we have to balance the objectives of the organisers, the needs of our representative teams for practice, and the benefits of providing international experience to other players.

Recently we received two such invitations: for the German Bridge Team Trophy, and the Chairman's Cup in Sweden. In the first instance these were offered to the Open and Ladies Teams who will be representing us at the World Championships in Bali later this year. Subsequently we invited applications from recent participants in the top division of the Premier League and from the current Junior Team.

The German Bridge Team Trophy (which evolved from the Bonn Nations Cup) takes place in May. Thanks to the generosity of the German Bridge League we have been able to send a junior team consisting of Dan MacIntosh, Sarah O'Connor, Tom Paske and Ed Jones to test themselves against some very strong competition.

The team for the Chairman's Cup, subsidised by the Swedish Bridge Federation, will be announced in the next few weeks.

Both of these events are open to other entrants, so any pairs who miss out on selection may wish to consider playing under their own steam. More details are below.

German Bridge Team Trophy: Bonn; 8th-10th May, followed by the Bonn Cup pairs on 11th May. More details from www.german-bridge-trophy.de.

Chairman's Cup: Orebro, Sweden, 27th July - 1st August, followed by the Gold Mine pairs on 3rd-4th August. More details from www.svenskbridge.se/festival.

Camrose Update

The team have now completed two of their five matches for the weekend. Firstly we played Northern Ireland, and we lost by four imps, resulting in a 14-16 VP loss. Whilst a disappointing result, we still maintained a decent lead over the other competitors.
This morning we played Wales. The match featured some incredible boards, with three good grand slams coming up, and all three being bid at both tables. We suffered a little misfortune, when we bid a good game which went down on a 5-1 trump break, but emerged victorious by 21 IMPs for an 18-12 win in VPs. This leaves us reasonably well placed, especially as Northern Ireland lost heavily to the CBAI, and Ireland and Scotland played out a hard fought draw.
We play Scotland this afternoon, then Ireland on Sunday morning and CBAI on Sunday afternoon. All the action can be followed on BBO.

2013 Camrose

The Camrose is played over two week-ends, traditionally one in January and one in March. England have a narrow lead going into the second week-end with a score of 92 VPs, ahead of Northern Ireland (87), Republic of Ireland (85.5), Wales (77), Scotland (60) and CBAI (36). The England team for the first week-end in Belfast was made up of the foursome that won the Premier League, Frances Hinden, Graham Osborne, Jeffrey Allerton and Chris Jagger, plus David Price and Colin Simpson, with David Burn as non-playing captain.

The second week-end is being held on the outskirts of Dublin, so it is the Republic of Ireland who provide two teams for both week-ends (that is so that a team does not have to sit out for a match). The baton has been passed to the England team that will be playing in the Bermuda Bowl in Bali in September: Alexander Allfrey, Andrew Robson, Tony Forrester, David Gold, Tom Townsend and David Bakhshi, with Simon Cope as NPC. As NPC of England Open and Ladies’ teams over the past few years, Simon has won almost as many trophies as Sir Alex Ferguson.

The Republic of Ireland broke a period of England domination by winning four straight Camrose Trophies from 2005 to 2008. Since then the winners have been English Bridge Union (England’s ‘other’ team when we hosted the event in Oxford) in 2009, England in 2010, Wales (their first ever Camrose win) in 2011 and England again in 2012.

Nine of our twelve players (and both NPCs) are defending the trophy they won in 2012.

Enough of the statistical build-up: you can watch the matches on BBO and enjoy what we all hope will be a successful weekend. England start against Northern Ireland on Friday evening.

Lille: Women FINAL

Well, they did it and without giving the captain a finger nail biting session. The three sets against Russia yesterday to end the tournament were smooth with few hints of a bad set and we ended up winning by 69- our biggest win and thus both defending the World Mind Sports title won in Beijing and also adding this to the European title won in Dublin in June.

Lille: Women 10

The final against Russia, the 2004 winners of this event started with a doubled game at both tables. Nevena made it and the Russian did not so 12 imps to us. The first set is covered in the online bulletin available from the WBF site.

At the end of the day were are 24 boards up so a margin of 0.5 imps per board!

The final ends later today and the medal ceremony is shortly afterwards. Someone said to me yesterday that the 48 boards per day is not really "enough" however if you do this for four days in a round robin, followed by 4 96 board matches you will likely disagree. I'm exhausted and I'm only watching! 48 boards against very tough opposition who are setting you problems on nearly every board is a lot more draining than 48 boards against moderate opposition. We had a couple of easy matches in the round robin but nothing easy since.

Sweden look favourites for their very first world championship in the Open event.

Lille Women 9

The end of the marathon is in sight. 208 boards in the Round Robin followed by 4*96 boards if you want to win a medal. When we come home on Thursday I am not sure anyone will want to pop in to the YC for a
game although it is the championship Pairs which Heather is participating in!

From having a slender lead at the end of the first day against France we put the match beyond doubt in the next two sets to lead by 65. We lost a few in the last set but won pretty comfortably.

The final is against Russia so we are guaranteed at least silver. At Veldhoven last year in the Venice Cup we lost in the semi final and then lost the 3rd place play off. That is not a good feeling but our team are in sufficient form that a gold medal is very much on the cards. All of the match will be on BBO from 9.30 UK time each day.

News of the day from the open semi final was that those who put the word" invincible" before the name Monaco will have to think again as they were beaten in the semi final by Sweden. You would have got long odds on a final which did not involve Monaco, Italy or the USA at the start of the event.

Thank you to all of you who have sent emails or Facebook messages to the team. Much appreciated and good to know people are rooting for the team back in Blighty!