Editors: Carla Martins Soares Pedro Nunes Web edition (Edição em rede da responsabilidade de): 8th November 2004  WELCOME TO MADEIRA 2004 7th International Bridge Festival Welcome! Warm mornigs by the pool, lunch in a nice place with a sea view, afternoon playing bridge – it’s the 7th Madeira Bridge Open! We hope you had a pleasant trip. You can now see that Madeira is everything it was advertised – good weather and wonderful landscapes. If you haven’t seen it yet we’re sure you’ll be able to enjoy all that during the week. We are very glad you came and hope you have a memorable week. We are trying to do our best to offer you a good time. Please tell us what you need, and we’ll help you in all we can. As usual, we’ll be playing with people from many countries: Iceland (winners last year of the pairs), Estonia (winners last year of the teams), Norway, Sweden, Great britain, Romania and probably others that we don’t know yet. And here we are again to welcome you with today’s cocktail. Take the opportunity to have a look at the room we’ll be playing in and get to know the organizers, directors and opponents (especially those last). Later this evening you can come and play in our national simultaneous. It will begin at 9.30 pm so that you have plenty of time to have dinner. Tonight we only play for fun, but be prepared, for tomorrow the real battle begins... Have a good game all! Madeira Funchal, November 8-14, 2004

How right can a wrong decision be? Will the wrong decision be the right one if it turns out well? Or do you have to consider the whole picture?
Take the following deal from the Olympiads in Istambul that finished just this weekend.
It’s the Last Sixteen Knock-Out stages and it’s a grudge match: Italy vs. USA. As you may remember these two countries (although quite a different USA team and a slightly different Italian team) played in the finals of the last World Open Championships (the Bermuda Bowl), the American wining by just 1 IPM!
In the Open room sat some familiar faces to the Madeira bridge scene. Zia Mahmood was here in the eighties, playing with one of the great bridge Ladies of all times – Rixie Markus. Norberto Bochi was a winner of the teams event two years ago here, the same year his partner Giogio Duboin ended up in second place.
It’s 3 boards to the end and this is what the players pick-up:

Rosenberg led a small heart and the defence took the first four tricks. He then exited with a club. Declarer could now count 8 tricks and just had to find the ª Q for the 9th. He started cashing his tricks, trying to find out some more about the distribution. He won the club return in hand, with the Queen, cashed the Ace and King of diamonds and played a club to dummy’s Ace, followed by the King and Jack. On the last club, declarer parked his last diamond (he had already thrown two on the hearts). He now paused to consider. North had followed suit all the way and South had pitched two spades on the clubs. Duboin now had a pretty good idea of the opponent’s distribution. North had started with 4 Hearts, 4 Clubs, at least 2 diamonds (three at most) and so at most 3 spades (2 at least). South had 4 Hearts, 2 Clubs, at most 3 diamonds (2 at least) and so at least 4 spades (5 at most). So South was (at least) a 4 to 3 favourite to have the elusive Queen of spades. The tactical bridge had been completed but the strategy to employ had yet to be decided. Duboin then grabbed the score sheet and studied it, as seen by all in the VuGraph. He finally decided to play North for the ª Q and won his contract. He made an anti-percentage play to try and win another swing - which he thought was necessary to overcome the Americans.

Mark Horton wrote it like this on the Olympiad’s Daily Bulletin:

"On Vugraph, Duboin made a point of picking up his scorecard for a look as a prelude to finessing North rather than South for the ª Q. Estimating that his team was still trailing and believing a swing was need, Duboin made an anti-percentage play to try to turns things around.

As you can see, Duboin was right. In the closed room, the defense went exactly the same, and Weinstein played the same way to get the same information. After giving the matter due thought, Weinstein played the ªK and was down one."

Well it was the wrong decision since the percentages were against it. But it was the right one given that the Italians thought they needed a swing. Again it was a wrong one for the Italians ended up wining by 11 imps and only picked up 10 imps on this board. Had the ª Q been on the other side the Italians would have lost a match by 9 imps they should have won by one. But how can a decision have been wrong when it succeeds? He did make the contract!

It’s still a wrong decision! Players at that level should play with the odds! You see, had Duboin played exactly as Weinstein did in the closed room the match would have gone to Italy by 1 imp! That would have been a sweet revenge and a nice twist of fate! Why should players think by their own minds and trick destiny?

THE ORGANIZERS

Miguel Teixeira …is an Economist and works in one of Portugal’s major Banks (owned by one of Spain’s major bank’s). He is also Club Sports Madeira Bridge section manager and the President of ABM (Madeira Bridge Association).	Rodrigo Martins Soares …is a Mechanical Engineer and is the manager of a shipyard on the east side of the island. He is also Vice President of ABM.
Nuno Sardinha da Mata He is a Lawyer and has his own practice in Funchal. He is also Chairman of ABM.	Ricardo Fernandes …works full-time at the ABM. He teaches bridge both at schools and to grown-ups at the clubs.
The Editors
Carla Martins Soares She has a college degree in Pharmacy and works in Public Health.	Pedro Nunes …is a Communications Engineer and works in a private phone operator. He is also a Vice Chairman of ABM.
Our Tournament Directors
Rui Marques	José Júlio Curado