Many congratulations to Martha Ferguson and Judy King for pulling off a stunning victory in last Saturday’s Ladies Pairs, held over two sessions at Bermuda Bridge Club.

After an extremely tight first session, the first five pairs were less than 3 per cent apart with Judy and Martha leading from Gertie Barker and Sheena Rayner, Pat Siddle and Diana Diel, Betsy Baillie and Sharon Shanahan, and Sancia Garrison and Jane Smith.

The second session, however, was something totally different and remarkable. Martha and Judy put together a stunning 73.61 per cent game with second place at 53.47 per cent, a 20-point gap, which I’ve not seen before.

When the smoke had cleared Betsy and Sharon had moved into second, an excellent showing for a Strata 2 pair, with Gertie and Sheena in third and Sancia and Jane in fourth. Well done to all these pairs.

The win for Judy and Martha, a repeat of their 2023 success, is popular on many levels – both the winners have worked in the background of the club for years and Judy has shouldered all the tech/website stuff for as long as I can remember. Add to that both players having the humour and personality that makes them a pleasure to be around, and the stage was set for a popular victory.

What give me extra pleasure from this win is knowing how hard Martha and Judy both work at getting better at this game, and it’s great that the effort is rewarded.

They mentioned to me that players like Diana Diel, Marge Way, Charles Hall and Gertie Barker are always ready to give time and advice to help, and that their regular Sunday games with Richard and Wendy Gray have helped their development.

Diana and Marge make great role models, as they have reached the top level of the game in Bermuda but are still in a constant search to eliminate the errors that stand in the way of further improvement – recognising the need to keep working is the key, as no one has mastered this game.

Well done, Judy and Martha!

Next week, I will have a full report on the Junior Teams that concluded on Tuesday.

This week’s hand (see Figure 1) is a little more advanced than usual, but has some real instructional value in the declarer play and in the bidding.

South opened a 15-17 NT and North’s two-heart bid was a transfer to spades – South’s three-spade bid was a “super accept“ showing four spades and better than minimum hand and North had just enough to accept the invitation.

In a team game, neither player in the West chair wanted to make an aggressive lead because both of them felt such a lead could give the contract away – and yes, leading away from a Jack is often dangerous (give dummy Q10 and declarer Ax and you will see why). As a result, they both led a trump.

The first declarer played the ten of spades from dummy and took East’s Jack with his Queen and drew the remaining trumps with the Ace.

He crossed to dummy with a diamond to the King and ran the seven of clubs to West’s Queen. West exited with a low diamond to dummy’s Ace.

Declarer continued by playing a club from dummy. East’s diamond discard meant that he had a second club loser and that the contract would depend on the King of hearts making a trick.

Alas, West had both the Ace and Queen of hearts and this declarer was down one – a fairly well-deserved result for declarer, as the play was pretty pedestrian and showed no real thought or planning.

How would you tackle the hand? I’ll give you a hint – the play involves the sexy sounding “strip and endplay”, so with that in mind give it a try before seeing what declarer in the other room did.

At the other table, declarer also drew a second round of trumps with the Ace at trick two. Then he cashed dummy’s Ace and King of diamonds, returned to hand with a trump to the King, ruffed the ten of diamonds in dummy and, finally, ran the seven of clubs to West’s Queen. The position now is shown in Figure 2.

Based on South’s bidding, West knew he held the King of hearts, so he exited with a low club which was won in dummy with the eight, East discarding a low diamond.

Declarer now knew the layout of the hand and simply played the Ace and another club to West’s king and West found himself endplayed for a second time on the deal.

With only hearts remaining, West cashed the Ace of hearts and continued with a low heart to declarer’s King – ten tricks for declarer and a big win on the board.

The strip and endplay comes up very often, especially when you have good trumps in both hands, so keep a lookout for the opportunity over your next few games.

• David Ezekiel can be reached on davidezekiel999@gmail.com

BRIDGE CLUB RESULTS

Friday, June 13

North/South

1 Charles Hall/Sancia Garrison

2 Geoff Bell/Kathleen Bell

3 Tony Saunders/Patricia Siddle

East/West

1 Gertrude Barker/Molly Taussig

2 Martha Ferguson/Judy King

3 Aida Bostelmann/Wenda Krupp

Saturday, June 14

Ladies Pairs Championship

1 Judy King/Martha Ferguson

2= Betsy Baillie/Sharon Shanahan

2= Gertrude Barker/Sheena Rayner

Monday, June 16

1 Sheena Rayner/Magda Farag

2 Stephanie Kyme/Gertrude Barker

3 Tony Saunders/Charles Hall

Tuesday, June 17

Junior Teams Championship

1 Ross Cooper/Scott Gilbertson/Julia Tadman/Joshimer Hussey

2 Sarah Bowers/Stuart Clare/James Mulderig/Robert Mulderig

3 Heidi Dyson/Amanda Ingham/Jaime Ferrari-McComb/Edward Ferrari-Willis

Wednesday, June 18

1. Stephanie Kyme/Charles Hall

2. Patricia Siddle/Diana Diel

3. Sheena Rayner/Magda Farag