Defending a contract is full of risk and reward.

Occasionally the road is clear, as in Board 22.

East opens 1D, South bids 1H and North leaps to 4S.

East has 2 possible leads in either minor suit.

All chose a club lead, some the A but mostly the K.

As a preference, lead the K, as it promises the A or Q.

Dummy puts down the QJ1052 of clubs.

It would be very high risk to continue with the AC.

This may set up the remaining club suit with 2 aces as entries.

Best to start an attack on those 2 entries.

You have a 10-card fit in a suit, missing K and J.

The A and Q are in opposite hands.

You cannot afford to lose one trick in the suit.

What is the best line of play?

Do you play the Ace hoping to drop the singleton K.

Make your decision.

Board 22 shows 6D by West is makeable.

Seeing a definite heart loser, the diamond situation has to be guessed correctly.

33% chance the K is singleton. 

It appears only one West made the right choice, collecting 12 tricks.

A great hand to test your declarer play.

It's rare to get a hand with game in all 4 suits.

Points have to be shared and shortages abound.

Both sides have great double-fits.

In this unusual case, spades is out bossed by diamonds.

Bidding must have been frenetic.

When West overcalls 1S, East must leap to game.

This is to try to shut out N-S, who will be concerned about vulnerability.

One cool cucumber bid 5H and was lucky.

Albeit the defence has to be very good to take 5H down.

Consider defending 5H doubled.

A good 9 card trump fit requires 25 HCP's when both hands are balanced.

If one hand has a void opposite a poor 4 card suit, then 20 HCP's will do.

If opposite hands each have a void, well Christmas has come early.

Board 25 is a great example.

N-S have a good fit in hearts, and North has a poor diamond suit opposite a void.

Souths points in spades are mostly wasted opposite a Norths void.

Essentially a 12 HCP game in hearts.  Who would bid such a game?

The killing lead when voids and singletons abound is of course a trump.

Board 6 is a great hand where there are only low-level contracts.

With 3 hands having 11 points each, who opens the bidding?

As opener, is East too balanced to open 1C?

It does matter, if they Pass, E-W will not find their spade fit.

If South opens 1D, West will Pass and N-S will find 1NT.

If North is left to open 1C, again they will find 1NT

There are systems over 1NT for East to use to get to 2S.

Brozel, Capelletti, Don't, Landy, Ripstra, Roche, Scum, Suction.

Well done to 3 Easts who opened 1C. VULNERABLE !!  Brave people.

Last Friday our club celebrated a very special birthday, our club Patron Jan Jarrett turned 99 years old. Members joined in with our usual Friday Bridge plus a shared lunch with Jan. In recent months Jan has been unable to attend her usual Bridge sessions at the club so it was lovely to have her back at the club playing again and as the photo  shows she was in fine form .

Congratulations to Tom Henwood and Joyce Reid who won the Te Puke BOP Pairs tournament on Sunday with the impressive score of 66.57%.  Joyce substituted Jen Elgar for this round of the Bay Pairs, Tom and Jen are leading the competition with the final round to be played in Whakatane in October.  Fantastic!

One of the highlights of our Club competition year is the annual Teams tournament with teams competing for the Janet Milbank Memorial Trophy.  This year Swiss Pairs format was chosen and we had 8 teams enter.

Looking at the results for 2026, as with last year it was tough at the top with a very close competition and especially so for 2nd and 3rd place.

Winners : 84.30 VP Joyce Reid, Rex Tulloch, Karen Warren, Bronwyn Kamphorst

2nd:  80.6 VP Derek Moores, Bobbi Drysdale, Don Moore, Ali Barr

Thank you Trust Horizon for again supporting small clubs like ours with a generous Grant towards power costs. This year we have been successful with a $2500 Grant secured from the latest funding round. This amount of money will go a long way towards helping meet what is one of our most significant annual costs. We would like to acknowledge Trust Horizon for this donation.

The second heat of the 2026 Bay Pairs competition which was to have been held at Whakatāne on Sunday 12 April has been postponed due to the forecast weather and official advice for only essential travel on the day.

We will notify clubs of an alternative date as soon as possible.