June 2007 - 39

play bridge
A section designed with the newer player in mind.

The three T's
Last time, we talked about the alphabet soup of stratification. Now we
are off to the three T's: Team, Tactics
and Terminology. A team is usually
four people, and the two most common team offerings at tournaments or
clubs are the knockout and the Swiss.
Here are the mechanics of team
play. One half of your team sits East-
West and plays a number of boards
against another team. The other half
sits North-South and plays the same
boards against the same team. After
the match is over, you get together
with your teammates to compare
results on each deal. For example,
suppose North-South were plus 420
on a board and East-West were minus
450. This means the team lost 30
points (420 to 450). This is then converted to International Matchpoints
(IMPs). If you look inside your private scorecard, there is an IMP scale.
You see that losing 30 points is the
equivalent of minus 1 IMP. After all
the boards are compared, your IMP
results are totaled and, barring a tie,
your team is plus or minus IMPs.
When finished, you compare with
the other team and then report your
total IMP result to the director. If it
is a Swiss teams, the match is posted
in victory points (VPs). At the end
of the Swiss, the team with the most
victory points wins. In a knockout,
the scores are not converted to VPs.
If you are not bogged down with all
this terminology, you might be ready

for a few team tactics:
❖ Make your contracts. Play the
safest you can, even if it sacrifices a potential overtrick. Risk
going down more than one if that
play might make your contract.
❖ Try to set the opponents. Don't
worry about giving up an overtrick if you can find a plan that
might defeat the contract.
❖ Don't double for a one-trick set.
If something doesn't go right,
you might be giving up a doubled
partscore or game. You should
know you have the contract beat.
❖ Do not be eager to balance, especially if the opponents have not
found a fit. You might risk minus
200 or minus 300 instead of giving the partscore they were going
to make.
❖ Bid your vulnerable games or
slams. The bonus is so much
greater vulnerable that you cannot afford to miss a game (620
vs. 170 = 10 IMPs).
The knockout event has the winners continuing to play and the losers
being knocked out of the event. Your
competitors are determined by total
masterpoints for the team, with teams
put into groups or brackets. If you
win your first match, you will continue to play against people in your
own bracket. A typical knockout runs
three or four sessions, depending on
the number of teams in the bracket.

Notes from ACBL Accredited Teachers
June 2007

Val Covalciuc
ACBL Accredited Teacher
valerierick@comcast.net

Normally a knockout match is longer than a Swiss match and is most
often head-to-head. This means you
are matched against one other team
for 24 boards, for example, taking
a break in the middle to compare.
The team with the greater number
of IMPs wins, even if it is only by a
1-IMP margin.
The nice part about KO matches
is that you can have one or even two
bad results and overcome them. In the
shorter Swiss match, one big mistake
often spells disaster.
Most players love teams. Team
bridge is social, as you have three
teammates. It is comfortable to play,
as your goal is to get to the safest
contract and make it. You do not have
to fret over extra tricks. You can lose
one match or have one disaster and
still overcome it - or have teammates who overcome it for you.
Next time you go to a tournament
or see a team game scheduled at your
club, give it a try!
r

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Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of June 2007
