GREAT BRITAIN Wins Y2K NEC Cup

After having been defeated by their opponents the previous four times they played, GREAT BRITAIN (Paul Hackett, Justin Hackett, Jason Hackett, John Armstrong and Brigitte Mavromichalis) finally enjoyed the sweet taste of victory by defeating Japan's DEFENDING CHAMPIONS (Masayuki Ino, Tadashi Teramoto, Chen Dawei, Tadashi Imakura, Hiroshi Hisatomi and Takahiro Hirata) to win the 2000 NEC Cup. Britain overcame first- and second-quarter deficits with a huge 49-imp third-quarter comeback to take the lead after 48 boards. They took the fourth quarter as well, and emerged as 170- 141 winners. The finals was an exciting, fiercely-fought contest witnessed by dozens in the VuGraph audience. Congratulations to both teams for a thrilling conclusion to Japan's premier event. AUSTRALIA Defeats USA for NEC Cup 3 rd Place It's always disappointing to lose in the semi-finals and then to have to prepare yourself psychologically for a playoff for third place. That was the problem which faced the USA and AUSTRALIA teams, and AUSTRALIA clearly prepared well. After a 4-imp loss on the first deal, the Aussies peeled off three 25 straight imps. Another 5-imp pick-up for the USA was followed by 17 more imps for the Aussies, who cruised through the remaining ten boards to lead 75-34 at the half. Most of the early boards of the second-half were flat, and the Aussies gained the first two double-digit swings before USA struck back with a 17-imp gain of their own. But that was it for the Americans. AUSTRALIA won the second half 32-22 and the playoff for third place 107-56. Congratulations to Peter Newman, Ishmael Del'Monte, Seamus Browne and Khokan Bagchi for taking the bronze, and to Mark Itabashi, Gene Freed, Garey Hayden and Jim Robison for making it to the NEC Cup semi-finals- no mean feat. INDONESIA Wins Flight-A Ouchi Cup Congratulations to INDONESIA (Deny Sacul, Henky Lasut, Freddy Manoppo, Franky Karwur, Santje Panelewen and Robert Tobing), NEC Cup quarter-finalists, who went on to win the Ouchi Cup with a score of 185. Second were Canadians Irving Litvack, Roy Hughes, Darren Wolpert and Jurek Czyzowics with a score of 166, while third with 162 were MIYAKUNI Kenji, FURUTA Kazuo, TANAKA Ryoga and SHIMIZU Yasuhiro. Winners of Flight B with 177 were ANDO Yukie, KAIWA Fumio, AKITA Ken-ichi and UEDA Kunio. Flight C was won by NAKANISHI Mieko, KOSHI Haruko, JANSSEN Hiroko and OSAKO Yoko with a score of 187. The complete results can be found on page 3.

	NEC Cup Winners: Justin, Jason, Brigitte, Paul and John
NEC Cup 2 nd : Chen, Imakura, Hisatomi, Hirata, Ino and Teramoto	NEC Cup 3 rd : Bagchi, Browne, Del'Monte and Newman	NEC Cup 4 : Robison, Hayden, Freed and Itabashi
Ouchi Cup Winners - A	Ouchi Cup Winners - B	Ouchi Cup Winners - C

Tales of the Ouchi Cup: How I Came to Be Too Brilliant

We've all heard of the unlucky expert. Well here's yet another version of the saga from Saturday's final session of the Ouchi Cup. You can play along, too. As West you pick up: KQ10x Qx xxx xxxx. The auction is: West North East South Takayama-san   1 Pass 1 Pass 2 Pass 4 All Pass

North xxx 76xx AQxx AK West KQ10x Q8 xxx xxxx

What do you lead against 4? Say you choose the K-a popular choice in our estimation- and the following dummy appears: West I When East signals encouragement you continue with a low spade to partner's ace and win declarer's jack on the third round, the suit proving to be 4333. What now? Did you find the play of the fourth spade to promote your side a trump trick? Well, so did Takayama-san, only to find that the complete deal was:

As you can see, the ruff and discard you've provided is the only way for declarer to avoid a fourth and fatal loser-a diamond trick. So much for brilliance.

xxx 76xx AQxx AK KQ10x Q8 xxx xxxx Axx x Kxxx xxxxx Jxx AKJ109x xx Qx

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More Tales of the Ouchi Cup: Don't Mess With Hirata-san!

By day a mild-mannered university English professor. By night, he dons his Abe-Lincoln disguise and turns into...Hirata Man! We can see by the expression on your face that you don't believe us. Well, just watch. The place: the Pacifico Yokohama. The time: the first qualifying session of the Ouchi Cup.
Bd: 24 Dlr: West Vul: None 7 Q5 10652 987643 Q1063 J83 Q94 KQ10 A542 A974 873 J5 KJ98 K1062 AKJ A2	West North East South Hirata Man Hayashi-san Pass Pass 1 Dbl 1 Pass Pass 1NT Pass 2 2 2NT Pass 3 All Pass Hayashi-san was just along for the ride on this one. Those who know him know that Hirata Man works alone.
East led the A and switched quickly to the 8. Hirata Man rose with dummy's ace and ruffed a spade to hand, then led the 5! Imagine East's dilemma. If he rises with the ace Hirata Man can pitch his two diamond losers on the two major-suit kings (after unblocking the Q and using whichever minor-suit entry remains in dummy) to lose only two trumps and the two major-suit aces. If East ducks, Hirata Man will pitch his Q on the K and now will lose only one spade, one diamond and two trumps. A dread Morton's Fork.
Most think that Morton's Fork was named after the English cleric of the same name who long ago wrote of religious/ethical dilemmas of a similar nature to the one here. But Hirata Man knows better. According to him it was named after Reginald Morton, White House Chaplain during the period when Abe Lincoln served as 16 th President of the United States. As legend has it, says Makoto, "Reggie" (as he was known) was counseling Abe about the ethical pitfalls of deceiving the public concerning the vagaries of how the American Civil War was progressing. According to Makoto (who, by the way, claims he heard it directly from Abe. Right!), Reggie told Abe, "You can fool everyone some times, and some people all the time, but you can't fool everyone all the time."
Abe never forgot that, and when the above hand came up he applied it. As he said to East when the hand was over, "You can win the A and lose your diamond trick, or you can win your diamond trick but lose your A, but you can't win your A and win your diamond trick." Words to live by.

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