Crunch time had arrived and Lebi/Jacob and Fergani/L'Ecuyer were back in the fray against Pakistan to try and shake off their loss against France the evening before. Pakistan proved to be somewhat erratic and aggressive in their bidding techniques but the team prevailed in another basketball match - winning 60-36 for a 21-9 VP win.
Fergani/L'Ecuyer were joined for the second match against Japan by Demuy/Fourcaudot and the team put together a very strong match scoring 63 imps while only giving up 3 imps to secure a 25-2 victory and 46 out of 50 victory points for the day.
Even this strong Day 5 showing barely pulled the team back into a tie for the last qualification spot 4/5 with France at 241.5 victory points but only 1 VP behind Denmark for 3rd and 6.5 behind Estonia for 2nd. Right now Canada (1.34) is losing the IMP quotient tie breaker with both Denmark (1.40) and France (1.49) and would find itself on the outside looking in... This could all change on Friday with a very tight race to the finish line coming...
Given that the structure of the round robin is effectively one long match with common boards (although different opponents) one useful indicator of the overall quality of play of a given team is total IMPs. Canada's results VP wise have been very good but we have been winning by scoring lots of IMPs while giving less (but still lots away). Looking at total IMPs lost can be another good indicator to how well a team is performing. For France (-353 while scoring 527) this is a better feel for why they have moved up the table. Italy having given up only 251 while scoring 741 is even more impressive. Canada's record has higher volality and can be a risky way to win if the plus IMPs stop coming while the minuses continue (never mind the added stress on the captain as the results roll in).
Daily Observations
- During the drive to the finish it can be tough to make ground... Ireland and South Africa both had reasonable days but find themselves significantly further behind then where they started the day.
- Although mentioned elsewhere the German women are on a stunning pace winning 7 straight blitzes and averaging over 22 VPs per match.
- 2 of the other Open Groups are down to a battle among 5 teams for 4 positions. Note that the qualification score in those groups will be much higher then in Group A.
- Preempting with a long minor and side 5 card majors has had mixed results... Two 5-7 hands with spades yesterday favored an initial pass to allow finding the 4S game or sacrifice over 4 H, while the 5-7 hand with hearts and clubs the other day favoured being in 5C quickly to bury the opponents spade grand slam... Some of you might say you would never preempt with such hands but significant portions of the open field did showing the importance presently placed on the application of pressure.
- Initial Butler scores came out on-site today... These scores are much abused and the consensus appears to be that other than as a Captain's tool for assessing in match performance (once odd hands are tossed out) they are somewhat negative. They effectively provide IMP pairs scoring which does not adjust for random good or bad results, quality of opponents particular pairs have played or specific bad matches driven by extraneous factors. The scores tend to appeal to the more ego driven pairs but are not conducive to the team dynamics required for success. These scores should be used at your own risk in drawing any conclusions about what has happenned.
Hand of the Day
Round 13 - Board 14
This board is more for interest. E deals with none vulnerable.
A typical auction was 1H-2C-3H-5C followed by X, more hearts or more clubs. The interest is in the play. On anything but a heart lead 5Cx is cold by the South hand and always cold by North. An advertisement for always leading your partners suit.
Meanwhile 5H is cold on any lead and is presented as a play problem.
Looking forward to qualification on Friday (today) and look for the last day preview posted earlier.
No comments:
Post a Comment