Intro to on-line bridge. Bridge Column for August 12, 2001, By HARVEY BERNSTEIN North-South vulnerable. South deals. NORTH S: J 3 H: Q 10 9 7 D: K Q 2 C: A J 10 4 WEST EAST S: K 10 7 5 2 S: A 9 8 4 H: 2 H: A K J 4 D: A 10 8 6 5 4 D: 9 C: 9 C: 7 6 3 2 SOUTH S: Q 6 H: 8 6 5 3 D: J 7 3 C: K Q 8 5 The Bidding: SOUTH WEST NORTH EAST Pass Pass 1C Pass 1H Pass 2H Pass Pass Double Pass Pass Pass This hand was dealt during a session of "on-line" bridge. If you haven't been bitten by the bug yet, you are missing out on a lot of fun. There are a number of very good sites that you can try. If you have access to the Internet, go to the American Contract Bridge Leage's site, www.acbl.org, and click on the button that says "Online Bridge". This will take you to a list of links to all the current available locations. I joined OKBridge. Site navigation appeared to be a little easier at the ACBL On-Line site, but the fact that I have a number of bridge playing friends already on OKBridge pushed me in that direction. My partner and opponents on this hand were "future friends", which is to say that I did not know them. I asked if I could join their table and they invited me to sit down. We played for over an hour and it was very enjoyable. I held the West cards and found myself in the pass-out seat with only seven high card points. The fact that my opponents were willing to settle in two hearts meant that my partner was not broke. Holding the two suits that were not bid by the North- South pair, I doubled. If partner decides to bid spades we will make twelve or thirteen tricks, depending on the opening lead. With the vulnerability as it was, partner passed, converting my balancing double to penalty. I led the nine of clubs. Declarer won the trick and passed a heart to East's jack. East played the ace of spades and when that held, played the nine of diamonds. I won the ace and returned the ten of diamonds. East trumped with the four of hearts. A spade to my king was the entry for another diamond. At this point East was down to the ace-king of trump and South was able to claim the other tricks for down two. Plus 500 was a 61% matchpoint score. The hand was played by 40 other pairs and those results are available to you after the hand is over. A few pairs actually got to six spades, though you have to wonder how. Many pairs got to four spades making plus 480 or 510 depending on the opening lead. On-line bridge is not going to replace the local duplicate bridge club, but it is certainly going to allow a lot of players from all over the world to get a game in when they never could before. _______________________________________________ Bernstein is a free-lance writer in Solon.