[nickf]

For anyone who has actively followed the recent FP threads here, we have a Forcing Pass pair in the Semis (at least) of our National Open Teams this weekend.

Look for Ware-McManus in the Milne team - they may not play all sets as they're a team of 6.

Refer your BBO VuGraph Schedule for local times.

nickf
sydney

[JLOL]

Is that Griff Ware or a different Ware?

[andy_h]

It's Michael Ware, a kiwi

[JanM]

I watched Ware & McManus last night. Their system isn't really a forcing pass - their pass shows either 0-6 or 15-18. I suppose that after PP, third hand would be likely to bid with enough for game opposite the 15-18 hand, but in fact that never arose, since their opponents were (sensibly I think) just playing their normal methods after the opening Pass, so 2nd hand always bid. All of the opening Passes by Ware-McManus were 0-6 and the main effect of the pass was to deter partner from competing on one hand where competing probably would have been successful, and to help the opponents with the play of a couple of other hands. They opened 1♥ showing 7-10 any once, and the rest of the time opened 2-under 1 of a minor, which did cause some difference to the final contract from that at the other table, but not much.

[Cascade]

JanM, on Jan 25 2009, 06:48 PM, said:

I watched Ware & McManus last night. Their system isn't really a forcing pass - their pass shows either 0-6 or 15-18. I suppose that after PP, third hand would be likely to bid with enough for game opposite the 15-18 hand, but in fact that never arose, since their opponents were (sensibly I think) just playing their normal methods after the opening Pass, so 2nd hand always bid. All of the opening Passes by Ware-McManus were 0-6 and the main effect of the pass was to deter partner from competing on one hand where competing probably would have been successful, and to help the opponents with the play of a couple of other hands. They opened 1♥ showing 7-10 any once, and the rest of the time opened 2-under 1 of a minor, which did cause some difference to the final contract from that at the other table, but not much.

You are correct they describe their pass as semi-forcing.

I think this sort of pass is general convention chart legal as only strong pass systems are banned.

Of course there is a GCC problem with their 1♥ FERT.

[JanM]

Watching for a bit last night, I wondered whether playing a system like this with a lot of artificiality might involve so much drain on one's memory as to make other things more difficult. The last hand of the set I watched (I think it was the third set of the semi's, but perhaps the 2nd), one of them played 4♠ on this hand (how do some of you make those nice hand diagrams?)

         ♠ 98x
         ♥ ---
         ♦ Qxxx
        ♣ KQTxxx

♠ Txx           ♠ Kx
♥ Q98xx        ♥ Jxx
♦ ---          ♦ AKJxxxx
♣ AJxxx        ♣ x

        ♠ AQJxx
        ♥ AKxxx
        ♦ xx
        ♣ x

Auction was 3[C] - 3♦ - 3♠ - P - 4♥ - P - 4♠ -PPP

West led the heart 9, making it obvious to everyone within miles that he didn't have any diamonds.

Declarer ruffed the heart, led the K of clubs to the A. West shifted (wisely) to a trump, which went to the K and A. Declarer ruffed another heart and led the Q of clubs, which East ruffed. Overruff, pull trumps, cash heart AK leaving:

        ♠ ---
        ♥ ---
        ♦ Qx
        ♣ Txx

♠ ---        ♠ ---
♥ Q        ♥ ---
♦ ---          ♦ AKJxx
♣ Jxxx        ♣ ---

        ♠ x
        ♥ x
        ♦ xx
        ♣ ---

Now declarer claimed (correctly in my opinion) but he claimed -1, conceding the 3 red tricks. Surely if he'd been alert he would have known he could play a heart to West and pitch his diamonds on the J and ten of clubs? Maybe this was just "last boarditis," a disease from which lots of us suffer, but maybe it was aided by the drain of all the artificial bids.

[awm]

JanM said:

how do some of you make those nice hand diagrams?

When you make a post, there are a bunch of buttons above the window that you type in. these buttons include "Fullhand", "Onehand", "Onesuit" and so forth. Clicking on these brings up a form you can fill out to get a nice hand diagram.

Formatting a bidding sequence is unfortunately a bit more annoying.

As to Ware and McManus, I see a lot of play mistakes in these long grueling top-flight matches. There are plenty of plays made late in the late rounds of the Spingold and Wager (even by pairs playing "standard" methods) that seem pretty poor. This is just the natural effect of fatigue. While it's possible that playing unusual methods somehow contributes, it sounds like these guys play their stuff a lot. And personally I've found that methods like theirs are often structured heavily around relays, and that this is actually easier on the memory than remembering the very hefty bag of special cases/conventions that most serious expert partnership "two-over-one" methods seem to resemble.

[keylime]

I tend to agree with you Adam. I've noticed that when I'm a touch tired, knowing that Larry and I have 1C-1H-1S-2C-2D-2H equals 1M-2C-2H, and such, gives a solid foundation to the grind it out nature that a final KO can get. I think we win more imps in the last 8-10 boards of a KO match than anywhere else, due to the repeatability and parallelism of the structure.

[JanM]

awm, on Jan 25 2009, 01:03 PM, said:

As to Ware and McManus, I see a lot of play mistakes in these long grueling top-flight matches. There are plenty of plays made late in the late rounds of the Spingold and Wager (even by pairs playing "standard" methods) that seem pretty poor. This is just the natural effect of fatigue. While it's possible that playing unusual methods somehow contributes, it sounds like these guys play their stuff a lot. And personally I've found that methods like theirs are often structured heavily around relays, and that this is actually easier on the memory than remembering the very hefty bag of special cases/conventions that most serious expert partnership "two-over-one" methods seem to resemble.

I agree about late rounds of long matches, but this was the 2nd or 3rd quarter and they were playing on a 6 person team. Maybe it was just normal tiredness, but I'm not convinced.

[Cascade]

JanM, on Jan 27 2009, 07:13 AM, said:

awm, on Jan 25 2009, 01:03 PM, said:

As to Ware and McManus, I see a lot of play mistakes in these long grueling top-flight matches. There are plenty of plays made late in the late rounds of the Spingold and Wager (even by pairs playing "standard" methods) that seem pretty poor. This is just the natural effect of fatigue. While it's possible that playing unusual methods somehow contributes, it sounds like these guys play their stuff a lot. And personally I've found that methods like theirs are often structured heavily around relays, and that this is actually easier on the memory than remembering the very hefty bag of special cases/conventions that most serious expert partnership "two-over-one" methods seem to resemble.

I agree about late rounds of long matches, but this was the 2nd or 3rd quarter and they were playing on a 6 person team. Maybe it was just normal tiredness, but I'm not convinced.

After 5-days of qualifying - 4 day 3x20; 1 day 2x20.

At the end of the 5th day was the first knockout round in which they play 2x16 - making 72 boards for that day.

The sixth day had two lots of 2x16 in the knockouts.

This occurred on the seventh day in which there were 4x16 boards.

Most if not all of the players had played 64 boards of Swiss pairs the day before this even started and a similar number of boards in a Matchpoint event the day before that. Some also played various events finishing immediately before those events.

[sartaj1]

JanM, on Jan 26 2009, 01:13 PM, said:

"I agree about late rounds of long matches, but this was the 2nd or 3rd quarter and they were playing on a 6 person team. Maybe it was just normal tiredness, but I'm not convinced."

Maybe its a function of "system complexity" that i was at the table (holding the long diamonds) and missed that declarer had stuffed up as well, until i read this post !

Btw, the only thing i found a bit annoying playing against this version of FP was that 1H = 7-10 any seemed to come up all the time and make things a bit awkward. We had no bad results from it. But we hardly ever seemed to be able to make an "opening bid"

[PeterGill]

Mat McManus also directed the 41st annual Australian Youth Bridge Championships for eight days immediately prior to the National Open Teams. He is not your commonplace director. Mat works non-stop - directing, organising, scoring and predealing ALL the boards for a week. So Mat had every excuse to be tired -
but he was dummy.

This board was in the 3rd 16-board set, after McManus - Ware had sat out the
2nd set. Perhaps they had just found out that I would be sitting out all the second half of the match, and that had eroded their confidence and concentration?

McManus - Ware are not a regular partnership. They play one event together
each year - the National Open Teams - playing either Crunch or modified T-Rex
or some such unusual system. They were the only pair (of 192 teams) playing a HUM. Mike Ware plays fast, with lots of claims, and appears to have no problem whatsoever remembering the 60-odd page Crunch system. After the match one
of their teammates told me that McManus - Ware played a terrific week's bridge until the semi-final.

Perhaps the standard of the opposition contributed to their sub-par semi-final?

Peter Gill

[JanM]

sartaj1, on Feb 2 2009, 10:39 PM, said:

Maybe its a function of "system complexity" that i was at the table (holding the long diamonds) and missed that declarer had stuffed up as well, until i read this post  !

I bet your partner noticed!

Quote

Btw, the only thing i found a bit annoying playing against this version of FP was that 1H = 7-10 any seemed to come up all the time and make things a bit awkward. We had no bad results from it. But we hardly ever seemed to be able to make an "opening bid"

It didn't look as if this particular system would be difficult, except perhaps for those who can't deal with anything unfamiliar.

[akhare]

awm, on Jan 25 2009, 01:03 PM, said:

And personally I've found that methods like theirs are often structured heavily around relays, and that this is actually easier on the memory than remembering the very hefty bag of special cases/conventions that most serious expert partnership "two-over-one" methods seem to resemble.

Agree -- methods based on (symmetric) relays are easier to remember because they follow a template...

[the hog]

Symmetric relay is actually easier to play than say a 2/1 system, because of the point made by Atul. This is especially true at the game level. Contrary to popular misconception, the game is often faster as you have already a plan of the hands in mind before dummy goes down.

[Cascade]

The_Hog, on Feb 4 2009, 06:58 PM, said:

Symmetric relay is actually easier to play than say a 2/1 system, because of the point made by Atul. This is especially true at the game level. Contrary to popular misconception, the game is often faster as you have already a plan of the hands in mind before dummy goes down.

Provided that your system makes some effort to maximize the chance that the relayer is the declarer. The other hand knows nothing until the dummy appears.

[the hog]

Cascade, on Feb 4 2009, 02:03 PM, said:

The_Hog, on Feb 4 2009, 06:58 PM, said:

Symmetric relay is actually easier to play than say a 2/1 system, because of the point made by Atul. This is especially true at the game level. Contrary to popular misconception, the game is often faster as you have already a plan of the hands in mind before dummy goes down.

Provided that your system makes some effort to maximize the chance that the relayer is the declarer. The other hand knows nothing until the dummy appears.

Yeah Wayne, that goes without saying.

[sartaj1]

JanM, on Feb 3 2009, 01:54 AM, said:

sartaj1, on Feb 2 2009, 10:39 PM, said:

Maybe its a function of "system complexity" that i was at the table (holding the long diamonds) and missed that declarer had stuffed up as well, until i read this post  !

I bet your partner noticed!

I remember Tony mumbling something about leading a trump while we were waiting for score-up. He also said something about "surviving" which i didnt realize until i read this little writeup !

[PeterGill]

Ron Klinger wrote up the hand in his daily newspaper column yesterday - without mentioning that 4S could have been made in the ending. Admittedly, Ron was concentrating on the typically Aussie bidding at the other table.

I kept the cutting to give to Tony Nunn tomorrow to check what Tony says about the hand. Tony does not miss much.

Peter

[PeterGill]

I found out last night that the claim in this thread did not actually happen.

Declarer actually exited a heart to Tony Nunn, who played CJ
which was ruffed. Now declarer played a diamond and conceded.

Sometimes the play on BBO goes so fast that BBO operators cannot
keep up and are virtually forced to explain the play as a claim.

Peter Gill