Ostend Open, Two

Day 2 was a significantly tougher day, with matches against three potential qualifiers. We ended Day 1 2nd in our group. So far on Day 2 so good. It's been quiet which means that Townsend-Gold can play a match or two without a brass band rehearsing in the next room. We won the first match against Spain 19-11. If you want to try for the team decide what action you would take on:

975

43

Q1043

10965

You are vulnerable in 4th seat and it goes 3 — Dbl — Pass to you. Answer next blog (no cheating and looking it up on BBO).

The second match was against the fancied Russian team and we managed a narrow 4 IMP win including bringing home a grand slam on a finesse (no law against being lucky). Last match of the day is against Denmark just started. Ostend is basking in sunshine and it is not too hot to play bridge.

If you have nothing to do pop over.

Jeremy Dhondy

Ostend Open, One

The Open series started today (Wed 23rd). There are so many countries that the field is divided into two groups. We will play every other team in our group and then the top 9 out of 19 qualify for the second and final round robin together with the top 9 in the other group. We will carry forward our entire score against all other qualifiers. Our first two matches were against teams from the lower half of our group. We beat Monaco 25-5 in our first match. We played them first in Pau in 2008 also but then lost 8-22. We then played Estonia in the second match winning 25-5 again to head our group at this early stage.

Jeremy Dhondy