I do hope the scoring was pairs! As Reese once put it (in Practical Bidding and Practical Play) the fortunes of my team have been jeopardised on numerous occasions by unwise doubles. he had a further rant about players defending such doubles by saying “Well it would’ve worked if I’d underled my Ace at T3 and then partner had….; if it needed a tricky defence to beat it, the double was NOT all right. I’d hate to have to defend conceding 670 on this sort of hand to teammates, especially as 3N is close although on a diamond lead and spade back ducked, South must now play another spade not a diamond.
Ironically, reading Truscott’s book on 1965, there is a section on non-standard 1N opening bids. In 1981 I played against Boris in a London tournament (I can’t remember who he partnered, not Reese) and he opened 1N (12-14), X from partner, P, P and BS rescued himself to 2S (he had AKJxxx and a 13 count). It rolled round to me, I doubled it to show values and we duly conceded 670 although he apologised. This was before Lebensohl and the like were common of course but my knee-jerk patriotic reaction to the accusations (from the late 1970s) is starting to look a bit shakier. and I’m increasingly saddened.
Regards,
Iain
bobbywolffAugust 13th, 2024 at 9:48 pm
Hi Iain,
Sorry to confirm what I imagine you have grudgingly suspected, the cheating allegations of all the major parties (at least the ones in the world bridge news) are perhaps 100% true.
At least the major ones are, major meaning have been in the world bridge world news for a long enough time to be well known everywhere, many with World Championships under their
belts and even more sadly, relatively as good as their records, keeping in mind there was a fairly wide range of winners who profusely cheated (signals with partner!).
As a group. they were indeed bright, very numbers oriented, and from all walks in the world.
Why they did, would be an interesting undertaking, with only ego mentioned 100%. A common denominator would be teammates not quite in the class of being able to win consistently without their illegal prop. It takes the 4-6 players on a team being able to hold their own through the entire event and more big name cheaters who did, did not think (and strongly felt) that they wouldn’t win against the best in the world, unless they raised their results, at least a strong mark upward and every time they played an important match against a world class team.
End Result: Many Kudos to those very good to great world players (1 or more) who did not win, because he (yes and unlikely a she, although some should be mentioned as close, (Sabine Auken for one) did not cheat, but, were generally good enough (at least 2 partnerships) to have a chance.
to do so, but will always go down to me as among the greatest
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Hi Bobby,
I do hope the scoring was pairs! As Reese once put it (in Practical Bidding and Practical Play) the fortunes of my team have been jeopardised on numerous occasions by unwise doubles. he had a further rant about players defending such doubles by saying “Well it would’ve worked if I’d underled my Ace at T3 and then partner had….; if it needed a tricky defence to beat it, the double was NOT all right. I’d hate to have to defend conceding 670 on this sort of hand to teammates, especially as 3N is close although on a diamond lead and spade back ducked, South must now play another spade not a diamond.
Ironically, reading Truscott’s book on 1965, there is a section on non-standard 1N opening bids. In 1981 I played against Boris in a London tournament (I can’t remember who he partnered, not Reese) and he opened 1N (12-14), X from partner, P, P and BS rescued himself to 2S (he had AKJxxx and a 13 count). It rolled round to me, I doubled it to show values and we duly conceded 670 although he apologised. This was before Lebensohl and the like were common of course but my knee-jerk patriotic reaction to the accusations (from the late 1970s) is starting to look a bit shakier. and I’m increasingly saddened.
Regards,
Iain
Hi Iain,
Sorry to confirm what I imagine you have grudgingly suspected, the cheating allegations of all the major parties (at least the ones in the world bridge news) are perhaps 100% true.
At least the major ones are, major meaning have been in the world bridge world news for a long enough time to be well known everywhere, many with World Championships under their
belts and even more sadly, relatively as good as their records, keeping in mind there was a fairly wide range of winners who profusely cheated (signals with partner!).
As a group. they were indeed bright, very numbers oriented, and from all walks in the world.
Why they did, would be an interesting undertaking, with only ego mentioned 100%. A common denominator would be teammates not quite in the class of being able to win consistently without their illegal prop. It takes the 4-6 players on a team being able to hold their own through the entire event and more big name cheaters who did, did not think (and strongly felt) that they wouldn’t win against the best in the world, unless they raised their results, at least a strong mark upward and every time they played an important match against a world class team.
End Result: Many Kudos to those very good to great world players (1 or more) who did not win, because he (yes and unlikely a she, although some should be mentioned as close, (Sabine Auken for one) did not cheat, but, were generally good enough (at least 2 partnerships) to have a chance.
to do so, but will always go down to me as among the greatest