Spring Foursomes

[paulg]

The Spring Foursomes is the toughest event in the UK calendar, a double-elimination event run over nine sessions of 32 boards.

 

The international field features a large number of BBO players, BBO Vugraph commentators and a handful of forum posters. Hopefully the semi-finals and final will be shown on BBO.

 

There are currently 44 entries and my attempt at guessing the top 16 seeds is below.

1. Hugh McGann, Tom Hanlon, Adam Mesbur & Nick Fitzgibbon
   
2. David Mossop, Gojko Zivkovic, John Carroll, Tommy Garvey, David Price & Colin Simpson
   
3. Rob Helle, Steve Green, Ed Hoogenkamp, Egbert Henstra, Simon de Wijs & Bauke Muller
   
4. Glyn Liggins, Peter Crouch, Martin Jones, Neil Rosen, Andrew McIntosh & Gunnar Hallberg
   
5. Michael Byrne, Andrew Woodcock, Ben Green & Duncan Happer
   
6. Erwin Otvosi, Marek Borewicz, Grzegorz Narkiewicz & Krzysztof Buras
   
7. Simon Gillis, Boye Brogeland, Erik Saelensminde & Odin Svendsen
   
8. Jan Svendsen, Rune Hauge, Ingvar Erga & Pet Austberg
   
9. Alexander Allfrey, Andrew Robson, David Bakhshi & Tony Forrester
   
10. Tom Townsend, David Gold, Jack Mizel & Brian Senior
    
11. Janet de Botton, David Burn, Jason Hackett, Justin Hackett, Artur Malinowski & Nick Sandqvist
    
12. Geoffrey Wolfarth, Gary Hyett, Valio Isporski & Vladi Kovachev
    
13. John Armstrong, John Holland, Paul Hackett & Tony Waterlow
    
14. Tim Rees, Filip Kurbalija, Chris Jagger & Ian Pagan
    
15. Patrick Jourdain, Tony Ratcliff, Mike Tedd & John Salisbury
    
16. Jeremy Dhondy, Keith Bennett, Heather Dhondy & Rob Cliffe
    

The rest, in order of entry:

1. Michael Kennedy, Richard Brewer, Michael Keogh, Trevor King, Marion King & Jurdy Pearce
   
2. Michelle Brunner, John Hassett, Bill Hirst & Nicola Smith
   
3. Shireen Mohandes, Andy Bowles, McKenzie Myers & Dave Brower
   
4. Paul Gipson, Alex Gipson, Harry Smith & Finlay Marshall
   
5. Simon Cope, Stuart Haring, Tom Slater & Andrew Murphy
   
6. Susan Stockdale, Dave Cropper, Roger Bryant & Keith Stanley
   
7. Margaret James, Sally Brock, Martin Nygren & Charles Wigoder
   
8. Sarah Teshome, Richard Winter, Steve Ray & Georgia Ray
   
9. Richard Bowdery, Liz McGowan, Richard Palmer & Ed Scerri
   
10. Sarah Dunn, Dom Goodwin, Gordon Rainsford & Paul Martin
    
11. Malcolm Mitchell, Judy Mitchell, John Harrison & Nawal Fenwick
    
12. Peter Czerniewski, Chris Dixon, Irving Gordon & Bill Pencharz
    
13. Bingyuan Yang, Ed Jones, James Thrower, Tom Rainforth, Rob Myers & Daniel McIntosh
    
14. David Ewart, Ryan Stephenson, Liz Clery plus one
    
15. Helen Schapiro, Maureen Hiron, Sue Maxwell & Ian Mitchell
    
16. Robert Miller, Trevor Thrower, Jimmy Deacon & Chris Wormleighton
    
17. Paul Huggins, Dom Pinto, Luke Porter & Stephen Hurst
    
18. Bernard Teltscher, Victor Silverstone, Ross Harper & Martin Hoffmann
    
19. Peter Garner-Gray, Stuart Matthews, Andrew Prothero & Alan Stephenson
    
20. Malcolm Pryor, Malcolm Harris, Rolf Alexander & Bill Hodgkiss
    
21. Robert Procter, Michael Robinson, Nathan Piper & Chris Cooper
    
22. Mike Bell, David Collier, David Hodge & Andre Kueh
    
23. Richard Hillman, Jon Green, Chris Chambers & Jim Gobert
    
24. Nevena Senior, Sandra Penfold, Gitte Hecht-Johansen, Peter Hecht-Johansen & Knutt Blakset
    
25. Nick Doe, Simon Husband, Stuart Nelson & Alan Shillitoe
    
26. Emma Hyde, Peter Stocken, Heather Bakhshi, Alice Kaye & Juliette Milligan
    
27. Jonathan Mestel, Cath Jagger, Paul Fegarty & Catherine Curtis
    
28. Brian Spears, Milo Dragic, John Murdoch & Derek Sanders
    

Entries are still open and I'm sure the EBU would prefer 48 teams. 64 teams gives the perfect movement but I have no idea when they last had that number (if ever). The winning team will get approximately £2,000.

[Guest Jlall]

I don't see Frances or Jeffery on there, they're not playing?

[Finch]

We were thinking of entering, but here are the reasons why not:

 

- We both have full time non-bridge jobs. The spring 4s is not really an event for people who have office jobs during the week. Doing well in the S4s means taking Tuesday off work, but you won't know until Monday whether you need Tuesday off or not, which is a bit difficult. It also starts on Friday evening, which both means leaving work early and being very tired on arrival and hence likely playing not at our best. Jeffrey remembers getting a walkover in the semifinal (while he was still a student) because one of the oppo, who hadn't expected to do so well, had to go back to work.

 

- It's in Stratford-on-Avon. A lovely town, but a fair way from where we live and the hotels are very expensive and often very booked up for that weekend (it's a holiday weekend in England).

 

Between now and the second weekend of June, we have the following weekend engagements:

- the English national pairs championship final (one full weekend)

- the final of the English mixed teams competition (60 boards)

- One (possibly two) Gold Cup matches (48 boards each) (the British championship)

- A Crockfords match (the English teams-of-4 championship), 48 boards. And if we win that (which we are strong favourites to), the Crockfords 'finals' (last 8 teams, another full weekend)

- A 48-board county KO final, and whether or not we win that, the weekend county teams-of-4 winners championship (the other finalists are allowed to add us to their team if they win, and will do so).

- The metropolitan cup (local invitational event which somehow Jeffrey agreed to be the captain for our county team so feels obliged to play in)

 

on top of that, we also have to fit in one county league match and two county pivot teams matches, although they will be weekday evenings (and involve alchohol).

 

And we are likely to play in the Spring Bank Holiday congress (another long weekend at the end of May) which has a slightly more relaxed timetable.

 

Oh yes, and our regular team-mates have said there is too much bridge on at the moment and please can we not play in the S4s.

 

So we are not playing in the Spring fours, and we are not playing in the Corwen (another weekend pairs championship), and we are still playing nearly every free weekend day for the next two months.

[jchiu]

The proper names on the 12th seeded team are

 

Valio Kovachev - Vladi Isporski

 

They are a top Bulgarian pair who has done quite well recently. If I recall correctly, they won in 2005 and were second in 2006, both times with Geoffrey Wolfarth as their captain. I am surprised that they are not seeded higher (e.g. the American Vanderbilt and Spingold seeding would have given them a large number of seeding points for this).

[Finch]

I am surprised that they are not seeded higher (e.g. the American Vanderbilt and Spingold seeding would have given them a large number of seeding points for this).

The seeding above is Cardsharp's guess as to what the seeding will be, not what it is.

 

The seeding committee don't have a formal 'seeding point' approach, they each put forward their suggested seeding order and then argue about it.

[mike777]

The Spring Foursomes is the toughest event in the UK calendar, a double-elimination event run over nine sessions of 32 boards.

 

The international field features a large number of BBO players, BBO Vugraph commentators and a handful of forum posters. Hopefully the semi-finals and final will be shown on BBO.

 

There are currently 44 entries and my attempt at guessing the top 16 seeds is below.

1. 
    
    
   
2. Hugh McGann, Tom Hanlon, Adam Mesbur & Nick Fitzgibbon
    
   
3. David Mossop, Gojko Zivkovic, John Carroll, Tommy Garvey, David Price & Colin Simpson
    
   
4. Rob Helle, Steve Green, Ed Hoogenkamp, Egbert Henstra, Simon de Wijs & Bauke Muller
    
   
5. Glyn Liggins, Peter Crouch, Martin Jones, Neil Rosen, Andrew McIntosh & Gunnar Hallberg
    
   
6. Michael Byrne, Andrew Woodcock, Ben Green & Duncan Happer
    
   
7. Erwin Otvosi, Marek Borewicz, Grzegorz Narkiewicz & Krzysztof Buras
    
   
8. Simon Gillis, Boye Brogeland, Erik Saelensminde & Odin Svendsen
    
   
9. Jan Svendsen, Rune Hauge, Ingvar Erga & Pet Austberg
    
   
10. Alexander Allfrey, Andrew Robson, David Bakhshi & Tony Forrester
     
    
11. Tom Townsend, David Gold, Jack Mizel & Brian Senior
     
    
12. Janet de Botton, David Burn, Jason Hackett, Justin Hackett, Artur Malinowski & Nick Sandqvist
     
    
13. Geoffrey Wolfarth, Gary Hyett, Valio Isporski & Vladi Kovachev
     
    
14. John Armstrong, John Holland, Paul Hackett & Tony Waterlow
     
    
15. Tim Rees, Filip Kurbalija, Chris Jagger & Ian Pagan
     
    
16. Patrick Jourdain, Tony Ratcliff, Mike Tedd & John Salisbury
     
    
17. Jeremy Dhondy, Keith Bennett, Heather Dhondy & Rob Cliffe
     
    

The rest, in order of entry:

1. 
    
    
   
2. Michael Kennedy, Richard Brewer, Michael Keogh, Trevor King, Marion King & Jurdy Pearce
    
   
3. Michelle Brunner, John Hassett, Bill Hirst & Nicola Smith
    
   
4. Shireen Mohandes, Andy Bowles, McKenzie Myers & Dave Brower 
    
   
5. Paul Gipson, Alex Gipson, Harry Smith & Finlay Marshall
    
   
6. Simon Cope, Stuart Haring, Tom Slater & Andrew Murphy
    
   
7. Susan Stockdale, Dave Cropper, Roger Bryant & Keith Stanley
    
   
8. Margaret James, Sally Brock, Martin Nygren & Charles Wigoder
    
   
9. Sarah Teshome, Richard Winter, Steve Ray & Georgia Ray
    
   
10. Richard Bowdery, Liz McGowan, Richard Palmer & Ed Scerri
     
    
11. Sarah Dunn, Dom Goodwin, Gordon Rainsford & Paul Martin
     
    
12. Malcolm Mitchell, Judy Mitchell, John Harrison & Nawal Fenwick
     
    
13. Peter Czerniewski, Chris Dixon, Irving Gordon & Bill Pencharz
     
    
14. Bingyuan Yang, Ed Jones, James Thrower, Tom Rainforth, Rob Myers & Daniel McIntosh
     
    
15. David Ewart, Ryan Stephenson, Liz Clery plus one
     
    
16. Helen Schapiro, Maureen Hiron, Sue Maxwell & Ian Mitchell
     
    
17. Robert Miller, Trevor Thrower, Jimmy Deacon & Chris Wormleighton
     
    
18. Paul Huggins, Dom Pinto, Luke Porter & Stephen Hurst
     
    
19. Bernard Teltscher, Victor Silverstone, Ross Harper & Martin Hoffmann
     
    
20. Peter Garner-Gray, Stuart Matthews, Andrew Prothero & Alan Stephenson
     
    
21. Malcolm Pryor, Malcolm Harris, Rolf Alexander & Bill Hodgkiss
     
    
22. Robert Procter, Michael Robinson, Nathan Piper & Chris Cooper
     
    
23. Mike Bell, David Collier, David Hodge & Andre Kueh
     
    
24. Richard Hillman, Jon Green, Chris Chambers & Jim Gobert
     
    
25. Nevena Senior, Sandra Penfold, Gitte Hecht-Johansen, Peter Hecht-Johansen & Knutt Blakset
     
    
26. Nick Doe, Simon Husband, Stuart Nelson & Alan Shillitoe
     
    
27. Emma Hyde, Peter Stocken, Heather Bakhshi, Alice Kaye & Juliette Milligan
     
    
28. Jonathan Mestel, Cath Jagger, Paul Fegarty & Catherine Curtis
     
    
29. Brian Spears, Milo Dragic, John Murdoch & Derek Sanders
     
    

Entries are still open and I'm sure the EBU would prefer 48 teams. 64 teams gives the perfect movement but I have no idea when they last had that number (if ever). The winning team will get approximately £2,000.

To my American eyes it does seem strange to see Robson/Forrester down at ninth.

You Brits would know better.

 

Many famous names are even lower I see. Hackets, Senior, Armstrong, etc

[the hog]

There are a few names that I am surprised at seeing so low -

John Armstrong, John Holland, Paul Hackett & Tony Waterlow.

Tom Townsend, David Gold

 

Seeing Erwin Otvosi's name here makes me smile. There are some wonderful Erwin stories around. Erwin is Polish, and a rich sponsor who used to live in Australia. In the days when smoking was allowed at the table, Erwin used to sit at and blow billows of cigar smoke from a big, fat cigar over everyone. He played with Stephen Burgess of Marston and Burgess fame, and an absolutely fantastic card player when he is not drinking. Erwin on the other hand is one of the worst bridge players you have ever imagined in your wildest nightmares.

 

On one occassion when I played against them, Erwin put down a dummy which bore absolutely no relation whatsoever to the hand he had described in the bidding. Burgess leaned over, looked at this, inspected each card as if the dummy smelt bad and said, "Erwin, go over to the bar, buy us all a beer, get the caddy to bring them back to us and don't show your f*** ugly face at the table until this f*** session is finished".

 

On another occassion when Erwin was declarer, Burgess turned his back to the table and played dummy's cards by throwing them over his head. When a kibbitzer innocently asked what was going on Burgess commented that he couldn't bear to see Otvosi murdering yet another hand. Needless to say the director was called and order restored. I have never seen a sponsor, particularly one who paid as much as Otvosi was forced to pay, insulted as much as he was by Burgess.

[mike777]

I am surprised that they are not seeded higher (e.g. the American Vanderbilt and Spingold seeding would have given them a large number of seeding points for this).

The seeding above is Cardsharp's guess as to what the seeding will be, not what it is.

 

The seeding committee don't have a formal 'seeding point' approach, they each put forward their suggested seeding order and then argue about it.

Btw are you the current Gold Cup Holder?

[Walddk]

Hopefully the semi-finals and final will be shown on BBO.

I contacted the EBU 10 days ago but haven't got anything back yet. I would be surprised if we don't show something (we did last year and the year before that).

 

Roland

[Walddk]

I am surprised that they are not seeded higher (e.g. the American Vanderbilt and Spingold seeding would have given them a large number of seeding points for this).

The seeding above is Cardsharp's guess as to what the seeding will be, not what it is.

 

The seeding committee don't have a formal 'seeding point' approach, they each put forward their suggested seeding order and then argue about it.

Btw are you the current Gold Cup Holder?

Current Gold Cup holders are John Matheson, Malcolm Cuthbertson, Brian Short, David Walker, Douglas Piper and John Murdoch from Scotland, defeating Townsend (Gold, Forrester, Mizel) from England in the final.

 

Very close match, 109-107 as far as I recall, and a thrilling finish on BBO.

 

Roland

[ulven]

On one occassion when I played against them, Erwin put down a dummy which bore absolutely no relation whatsoever to the hand he had described in the bidding. Burgess leaned over, looked at this, inspected each card as if the dummy smelt bad and said, "Erwin, go over to the bar, buy us all a beer, get the caddy to bring them back to us and don't show your f*** ugly face at the table until this f*** session is finished".

 

On another occassion when Erwin was declarer, Burgess turned his back to the table and played dummy's cards by throwing them over his head. When a kibbitzer innocently asked what was going on Burgess commented that he couldn't bear to see Otvosi murdering yet another hand. Needless to say the director was called and order restored. I have never seen a sponsor, particularly one who paid as much as Otvosi was forced to pay, insulted as much as he was by Burgess.

ROFL.

[paulg]

It is not easy (for me) to judge the relative strengths of the foreign-sponsored teams so I may have placed them too high, but it would not surprise me if the seeding committee did the same.

 

The seeding is less important in a double-elimination competition and the principal value is being in the top 16 seeds. This is particularly true when there are less than 64 teams and there are triads (with a single winner) in the first matches.

 

Having said that, the general strength of the field is good (very good for the UK) and probably 20 of the non-seeded teams would not be surprised if they beat any of the seeds in a 32-board match.

 

I expect one of my top four seeds to win. The Irish are preparing for the Bermuda Bowl and the fact that the next three teams are all six-handed shows how seriously they are taking it. The event is really a test of stamina and four-handed teams have often struggled on the final day.

 

Paul

 

BTW Frances has won the Gold Cup. I have got close to the Gold Cup twice (i) I play in the same team of eight as three of the current holders and (ii) used to play in the same club as Rees & Mossop when they won, but unfortunately have never got close just by using my playing ability.

[Finch]

I am surprised that they are not seeded higher (e.g. the American Vanderbilt and Spingold seeding would have given them a large number of seeding points for this).

The seeding above is Cardsharp's guess as to what the seeding will be, not what it is.

 

The seeding committee don't have a formal 'seeding point' approach, they each put forward their suggested seeding order and then argue about it.

Btw are you the current Gold Cup Holder?

Sadly not. We won it in December 2003 but not since.

[sceptic]

Never underestimate yourself. I will have £50 with anyone Paul and his team will come in the top ten, Good Luck

[paulg]

Never underestimate yourself. I will have £50 with anyone Paul and his team will come in the top ten, Good Luck

Not sure that's a good bet (another example of British understatement).

 

Of the outsiders the best forum poster to be on is probably the saint (team #25) who has a good recent record at Stratford.

 

Paul

[the saint]

I am surprised that they are not seeded higher (e.g. the American Vanderbilt and Spingold seeding would have given them a large number of seeding points for this).

The seeding above is Cardsharp's guess as to what the seeding will be, not what it is.

 

The seeding committee don't have a formal 'seeding point' approach, they each put forward their suggested seeding order and then argue about it.

Btw are you the current Gold Cup Holder?

Current Gold Cup holders are John Matheson, Malcolm Cuthbertson, Brian Short, David Walker, Douglas Piper and John Murdoch from Scotland, defeating Townsend (Gold, Forrester, Mizel) from England in the final.

 

Very close match, 109-107 as far as I recall, and a thrilling finish on BBO.

 

Roland

Sorry Roland, it was the team of Byrne, Morris, Hassett, Hirst, Holland and Brunner that lost this year's Gold Cup final by 2 IMPs.

[the saint]

The

There are currently 44 entries and my attempt at guessing the top 16 seeds is below.

1. 
    
    
   
2. Hugh McGann, Tom Hanlon, Adam Mesbur & Nick Fitzgibbon
    
   
3. David Mossop, Gojko Zivkovic, John Carroll, Tommy Garvey, David Price & Colin Simpson
    
   
4. Rob Helle, Steve Green, Ed Hoogenkamp, Egbert Henstra, Simon de Wijs & Bauke Muller
    
   
5. Glyn Liggins, Peter Crouch, Martin Jones, Neil Rosen, Andrew McIntosh & Gunnar Hallberg
    
   
6. Michael Byrne, Andrew Woodcock, Ben Green & Duncan Happer
    
   
7. Erwin Otvosi, Marek Borewicz, Grzegorz Narkiewicz & Krzysztof Buras
    
   
8. Simon Gillis, Boye Brogeland, Erik Saelensminde & Odin Svendsen
    
   
9. Jan Svendsen, Rune Hauge, Ingvar Erga & Pet Austberg
    
   
10. Alexander Allfrey, Andrew Robson, David Bakhshi & Tony Forrester
     
    
11. Tom Townsend, David Gold, Jack Mizel & Brian Senior
     
    
12. Janet de Botton, David Burn, Jason Hackett, Justin Hackett, Artur Malinowski & Nick Sandqvist
     
    
13. Geoffrey Wolfarth, Gary Hyett, Valio Isporski & Vladi Kovachev
     
    
14. John Armstrong, John Holland, Paul Hackett & Tony Waterlow
     
    
15. Tim Rees, Filip Kurbalija, Chris Jagger & Ian Pagan
     
    
16. Patrick Jourdain, Tony Ratcliff, Mike Tedd & John Salisbury
     
    
17. Jeremy Dhondy, Keith Bennett, Heather Dhondy & Rob Cliffe
     
    

The rest, in order of entry:

1. 
    
    
   
2. Michael Kennedy, Richard Brewer, Michael Keogh, Trevor King, Marion King & Jurdy Pearce
    
   
3. Michelle Brunner, John Hassett, Bill Hirst & Nicola Smith
    
   
4. Shireen Mohandes, Andy Bowles, McKenzie Myers & Dave Brower 
    
   
5. Paul Gipson, Alex Gipson, Harry Smith & Finlay Marshall
    
   
6. Simon Cope, Stuart Haring, Tom Slater & Andrew Murphy
    
   
7. Susan Stockdale, Dave Cropper, Roger Bryant & Keith Stanley
    
   
8. Margaret James, Sally Brock, Martin Nygren & Charles Wigoder
    
   
9. Sarah Teshome, Richard Winter, Steve Ray & Georgia Ray
    
   
10. Richard Bowdery, Liz McGowan, Richard Palmer & Ed Scerri
     
    
11. Sarah Dunn, Dom Goodwin, Gordon Rainsford & Paul Martin
     
    
12. Malcolm Mitchell, Judy Mitchell, John Harrison & Nawal Fenwick
     
    
13. Peter Czerniewski, Chris Dixon, Irving Gordon & Bill Pencharz
     
    
14. Bingyuan Yang, Ed Jones, James Thrower, Tom Rainforth, Rob Myers & Daniel McIntosh
     
    
15. David Ewart, Ryan Stephenson, Liz Clery plus one
     
    
16. Helen Schapiro, Maureen Hiron, Sue Maxwell & Ian Mitchell
     
    
17. Robert Miller, Trevor Thrower, Jimmy Deacon & Chris Wormleighton
     
    
18. Paul Huggins, Dom Pinto, Luke Porter & Stephen Hurst
     
    
19. Bernard Teltscher, Victor Silverstone, Ross Harper & Martin Hoffmann
     
    
20. Peter Garner-Gray, Stuart Matthews, Andrew Prothero & Alan Stephenson
     
    
21. Malcolm Pryor, Malcolm Harris, Rolf Alexander & Bill Hodgkiss
     
    
22. Robert Procter, Michael Robinson, Nathan Piper & Chris Cooper
     
    
23. Mike Bell, David Collier, David Hodge & Andre Kueh
     
    
24. Richard Hillman, Jon Green, Chris Chambers & Jim Gobert
     
    
25. Nevena Senior, Sandra Penfold, Gitte Hecht-Johansen, Peter Hecht-Johansen & Knutt Blakset
     
    
26. Nick Doe, Simon Husband, Stuart Nelson & Alan Shillitoe
     
    
27. Emma Hyde, Peter Stocken, Heather Bakhshi, Alice Kaye & Juliette Milligan
     
    
28. Jonathan Mestel, Cath Jagger, Paul Fegarty & Catherine Curtis
     
    
29. Brian Spears, Milo Dragic, John Murdoch & Derek Sanders
     
    

Entries are still open and I'm sure the EBU would prefer 48 teams. 64 teams gives the perfect movement but I have no idea when they last had that number (if ever). The winning team will get approximately £2,000.

Since then, Denning, Shields, Goodman, Keaveney and Thomas have entered, so they may dent the top 16.

 

How the EBU does it is that the Seeding Committee each pick their own personal top 10 and then argue about which order to put them in. The remainder down to 32 are ordered in terms of total Gold Points amongst the side, and 33-48 are drawn randomly amongst the 16 remaining positions.

 

 

I think the Dutch will be seeded lower. They always start well, but from what I recall, Muller always has to disappear on the Monday and then the team seems to make a rapid exit...

 

The boys will be lower (Byrne, Woodcock, Happer, Green) as will the Poles (a stronger Bulgarian side was only seeded 12th last year) as will the Hauge Norwegians who never seem to perform to seeding (I've seen Helness playing in the consolation Swiss). Wolfarth's two finals will see his side higher up despite the change from Senior to Hyett, and Mizel will be slightly higher too. De Botton will be in the top 5. I suspect that the seeding committee will have down to 13 on their list, and then Gold Points will take over from there, but the Rees, Dhondy and Denning teams will probably be 14-16 on that basis and I reckon Jourdain will be outside the top 16.

 

Me personally, I'm not sure if we have enough Goldies between us to make the top 32 as we don't play too many big events. ON performance we should be in the 2nd tier of teams having reached the last 10 in 2 of the last three years, but it never works that way...

[paulg]

Me personally, I'm not sure if we have enough Goldies between us to make the top 32 as we don't play too many big events. ON performance we should be in the 2nd tier of teams having reached the last 10 in 2 of the last three years, but it never works that way...

I don't think it matters very much if you are in the second or third tier, being in the top 16 is the key.

 

I have no idea whether we'll be in the second tier either, as 3 of us are foreign we do not have any gold points. They will have the same problem with SPEARS.

[the saint]

Well there are a few teams I am as near as 100% certain we will turn over on that list. I would rather be in the second tier facing them, and then being free to concentrate on knocking over my top seed. Second in the group usually gets you a reasonable Saturday evening match if nothing else.

[Impact]

Perhaps the best Otvosi story to my personal knowledge was Erwin playing in 4H with 17 (or maybe only 15) top tricks painstakingly making 13 tricks - and Stephen Burgess "Erwin , Well done - you took 13 tricks and all on the one hand": Otvosi beamed and took another puff on his cigar.....

[MickyB]

Seedings have been announced -

 

http://www.ebu.co.uk/competitions/may/spri...s/entries07.htm

 

Triangles are formed with seeds

 

1, 32, 33

2, 31, 34

3, 30, 35 etc

 

So my team has been drawn against

 

Erwin Otvosi, Marek Borewicz, Grzegorz Narkiewicz & Krzysztof Buras

 

Michelle Brunner, John Hassett, Bill Hirst & Nicola Smith

 

Any advice on playing against Otvosi would be welcomed :)

 

 

There are some fairly strong unseeded teams (33-48 are allocated randomly) - The Saint and Cardsharp are both unseeded, as are the team of Nick Boss, Richard Johnson, Fiona Brown and Barbara Hackett.

[cherdano]

(33-48 are allocated randomly)

That's what I'd claim too if I were you :)

Good luck!

[mike777]

Exciting. Win! Best wishes and good luck.

[han]

Good luck Mike, Paul and Alan. I see ewj and sheepman are also playing so good luck to them too.

[Echognome]

Good luck Mike, Paul and Alan. I see ewj and sheepman are also playing so good luck to them too.

Unfortunately, I know too many of the teams to wish anyone here good luck. I am rooting for the dutch team which has two of my good friends on it (probably the two you haven't heard of), and the team of Stockdale, Cropper, Bryant, and Stanley who has three of my former teammates.