Tips from Barnet Shenkin: Scotland’s World Champion
The only World Bridge Champion Scotland can claim is Michael Rosenberg. Michael went to Hutcheson’s Grammar School and after playing bridge for only three years, at 19 participated in Scotland’s Camrose winning teams in the 1970s.
First with Dr Gerald Haase, and then on twice with the writer. In 1976 we made a successful trip to The Sunday Times Invitational Pairs and also brought home the Gold Cup with a team including Tony Priday and Claude Rodrigue and Victor Goldberg with Patrick Jourdain- a Scotland-England –Wales combination.
In 1977 we played for Great Britain in the European Championships and then Michael was gone to USA. However, we did play one more time after he left, finishing second in the New York Cavendish Invitational worth 50,000 dollars.
Michael’s most famous and longest partnership was with Zia Mahmood, and they played successfully for many years. He has won six World Championships . Two were in Open teams, two in Senior teams, one in Mixed teams in partnership with his wife Debbie and one in an individual par contest with set problems.
Recently their son Kevin has been doing very well in the American Nationals. Kevin married Amber Lin last year. Michael and Debbie, Kevin and Amber teamed up in the USA Mixed trial along with Disa Eythorsdottir originally from Iceland and the team sponsor Xin Ge.
Here is a hand from the semi-final.
♠ 983
♥ AJ5
♦ 2
♣ AKT865
♠ AQJT52
♥ T
♦ J3
♣ J742
♠ 4
♥ KQ9873
♦ AKT98
♣ 9
♠ K76
♥ 642
♦ Q7654
♣ Q3
| West | North | East | South |
|---|---|---|---|
| Molson | Michael R | Hampson | Debbie R |
| Pass | |||
| 3♠ | Pass | 4♥ | Pass |
| Pass | Pass |
East – West were both strong professional players. Debbie led the ♣Q and after some thought Michael overtook with the ♣K and continued with the Ace. Declarer ruffed low. Had declarer crossed to the ♠A to run the ♥10 ,he would have the time to come back to hand with ♦A, and then drive out the ♥A, before drawing trumps and conceding a diamond.
However, at trick three Declarer played the ♥K to the Ace. Another club was led and declarer ruffed, South pitching the ♦6. The ♥Q and another put North back in. Declarer had pitched two spades from dummy. Declarer had shown up with six hearts and one club. The only chance for the defence is if he also held five diamonds and one spade or the spades come in. The normal play would be a diamond from the North hand. Declarer would win the Ace, cash his last heart pitching the ♠10. Next a spade finesse of the Q. Now declarer cashes the ♠A and ♣J coming down to a two card end position.
South has to unguard the ♦Q and so Declarer makes the last two diamond tricks. Had North held Qx diamonds this play is also good. Declarer reading the distribution is more likely to place the ♦Q with South. Having worked this out, Michael ,instead of returning a diamond switched to a spade into the jaws of Dummy’s spades. This disrupted the communications and the contract had to go down one – the defence scoring their diamond trick.
This defence is similar to the the play made by another Michael, - Klukowski of Poland which has been submitted for the best defence of the year award.
This hand contributed to a big win in the semi- final and they went on to defeat the Hamman team – Bob Hamman, still an icon playing bridge in USA – in the final when that team withdrew with one session still to play , more than 100 pts behind. So, this is likely the first time that four family members will represent a country in the World Championship. The Championship will be held in Barbados in 2027. We wish them success.
