Welcome to Cuebids Weekly: The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly, a new series highlighting some of the most interesting hands from the Cuebids weekly tournament. Daily Events (8 boards) are held every day, Weekly Events (24 boards) are held once a week. For those unfamiliar, Cuebids is an online bridge bidding platform designed to help players improve their bidding skills through practice sessions and events. It is one of the most widely used bridge bidding websites, attracting pl

Based on the R64 results, the over/unders will look a little different this time around. Andresen vs. Allard Andresen: −18.5 | O/U: 225.5 Allard escaped with a comeback victory in the R64, but Andresen should take over given their superior team strength. SPS Kielce vs. Zimmermann Zimmermann: −25.5 | O/U: 230.5 I feel like this could be one of the upset matches. Zimmermann beat SPS Kielce by a small margin in the Swiss, but clearly anything could happen tomorrow. Still, Zimmer

Juls vs. Bianchi Juls: −25.5 | O/U: 199.5 The All-Pro Bulgarians take down Bianchi despite the potential challenges they may present. McAllister vs. Schonfeld Finesse Schonfeld Finesse: −29.5 | O/U: 196.5 The six-handed Schonfeld Finesse would certainly give them an advantage. But beware of the Dutch on McAllister, as they could make this matchup more competitive than expected. Nickell vs. GX2S Nickell: −27.5 | O/U: 197.5 Nickell still has the edge, but they have new partners

Below are the odds and spreads. Negative spreads indicate the team is favored. Andresen vs. Ceta Andresen: −55.5 | O/U: 211.5 Getting the chance to pick their opponents, this should not be too big of an obstacle for soccer player Martin Andresen’s team. Team Sweden vs. Allard Team Sweden: −9.5 | O/U: 205.5 This certainly feels like one of those 32nd vs. 33rd seed matches in the R64. It could certainly go either way, but I think Sweden would outlast the French. Zimmermann vs.

I remember a couple of months ago, when my opponents made a grand slam off a trump king, and I made a small finesse that depended on finessing a side-suit king in the same round of a sectional Swiss. This hand from the fourth round of the Swiss oddly reminded me of that phenomenon. On a normal day, you would think that playing in slam on this hand would look stupid, given that you could voluntarily find out that you were missing two keycards if spades were trumps. It would be

Our Round of 32 board comes from the second hand of the final quarter. It's not hard to see why: due to the presence of a grand slam, the board made huge swings in 11 of the 14 matches (2 teams withdrew). But what I want to discuss is the play of the grand: North overcalled 1H over West's opening, and, at most tables that reached 7C, the HK was led. The play is the main problem: North's 1H overcall cautions us to guard against a potential overruff from South. If we use two di

With the World Bridge Series already started (oops we're late), we will nominate up to two of the most exciting boards every day. We will begin with the knockout stage of the mixed, so follow along for updates as the World Bridge Series progresses! To check the live results, click this link below: https://db.worldbridge.org/Repository/tourn/katowice.26/microsite/results.htm

Despite being two weeks late, we still decided to write up this edition. Scoring 64.5 out of a possible 72 stars overall, the set was fairly average, finishing slightly below the overall average among the roughly 440 pairs who participated. While many of the hands were relatively straightforward 3-star boards, there were still a few standout moments. With fewer exceptional bids than usual, this week featured more interesting mistakes, misunderstandings, and unexpected results

Italy was already out of contention and would miss the Bermuda Bowl after qualifying for so many consecutive years. As a result, this match had little impact on the standings, but we'll still feature two interesting hands to keep things short and sweet. Schaltz Gerli Bilde Manno 2♥ 3♣ 3♥ 5♠ AP Andrea Manno declined his partner's slam invitation, as he did not hold a heart control. The 5♠ bid presumably asked for a control in the opponents' suit. This resulted in 650 for the I

Switzerland was already in deep trouble, sitting a little over 15 victory points behind the qualification line. England, meanwhile, was in a much more comfortable position, sitting in 6th place and nearly a full match ahead of the teams chasing them. Switzerland needed two massive wins to keep their Bermuda Bowl hopes alive, while England only needed to maintain their form and avoid a late collapse to secure their place among the qualifiers. Paske Kalita Gold Klukowski P 2♠ X

On the schedule, Switzerland was set to face several of the tournament's strongest contenders near the end of the round robin. Their opponents this time were Belgium, who sat in 13th place, eight victory points behind Switzerland, who occupied 12th. The Swiss entered the match having already lost five consecutive matches, including recent defeats against Norway, Bulgaria, and Denmark. Unfortunately, the bleeding continued. Despite seven push boards in the set, Switzerland was

Before this encounter, Denmark still trailed the gold medal position by around 12 victory points, while Switzerland was fighting to keep its Bermuda Bowl hopes alive. Having lost four consecutive matches, the Swiss had fallen five victory points behind eighth place and were in desperate need of a turnaround. Would this finally be the match that kept their qualification hopes alive? Given the location of the ♣K, slam appeared to be an excellent contract. Even if West had held

With only a few rounds remaining, this match carried huge implications for both teams. England and Denmark were not only fighting to stay inside the top eight, but were also well within reach of the medals. A big win would strengthen both their qualification chances and their hopes of finishing on the podium, while a loss would make the final rounds far more stressful. This was one of those gambling hands, with the East hand holding a long, solid source of tricks. The only pr

As the tournament entered its closing stages, this match carried enormous implications for both teams. Norway sat in second place, just 1.26 victory points behind Denmark. A win here could propel them into first, especially with Denmark facing the equally dangerous French team. Even a narrow loss would likely keep Norway firmly in the race for the top spot. The situation was far more precarious for Switzerland. After consecutive losses to Georgia and Lithuania, two teams that

Score: 31-57. Many exciting boards in this match! Board 19 With both NS pairs playing a strong NT, many would expect the auction to end after North opens 1N. However, neither table followed the expected scenario. First, Belgium's NS pair: West (Paske) North (De Donder) East (Gold) South (Bahbout) P P 1N P 2C P 2D P 2N P 3N All Pass Bahbout decided that with the 5-card club suit and major suit holdings, he was strong enough to invite to 3N. He may have been planning on bidding

The score was extremely close, with Norway edging out the victory in a 51-56 IMP win. Board 19 6D by EW is cold, yet surprisingly, neither table reached it as their final contract! I'm sure both pairs would reach 6D if it was an uncontested auction, but of course, the opponents have to get in the way. Norway stopped in 5D after South opened 1S: West (Berg) North (Yilmaz) East (Grude) South (Kubac) 1S X 3S X P 3N P 4S P 5D All Pass East's double was responsive, showing the min

These two teams met last year in the quarterfinals of the Bermuda Bowl. Sweden destroyed the Swiss hopes of winning three consecutive titles in that event. Will the tables have turned this time around though? Klukowski O. Rimstedt Kalita M. Rimstedt P P P 1NT P 2♦ P 2♥ P 2♠ (1) P 2NT AP Invitational with 5 hearts Jacek Kalita declined the game try made in this room, despite holding three card support. His hand was likely more suitable for no trump, but perhaps that option cou

With only nine matches remaining in the tournament, the featured matchup was Iceland against Norway. Iceland had quietly emerged as one of the tournament's dark horses, as few would have predicted them to be in contention for a top-eight finish at this stage. This set, however, was absolute chaos. There were so many entertaining and swingy deals that I genuinely had to use a random number generator to decide which ones to cover. Nearly every board had something interesting to

With so many swings this round, and most of them overlapping between the two matches, I would like to analyze the interesting boards for both matches at the same time rather than separately. Bulgaria lost 6-82 and Germany won 62-50. Board 3 Clearly, EW are destined for a major suit game. But which one? As it turns out, because of the heart ruff, 4S is down 1 while 4H makes. Although it seems like hearts are better, it's very easy for West to insist on spades being trump, whic

Switzerland won this tight round 33-27. Board 18 Let's look at the Italian NS table first: West (Klukowski) North (Sementa) East (Kalita) South (Versace) P P 1D 1S X 4S P P 5D All Pass The auction feels fairly normal: NS did a good job of forcing EW to guess. East could've doubled, but since their side had a diamond fit (1D showed 4+), he opted for a 5D bid instead. Additionally, East's defensive values are soft, meaning 4S doubled could make, especially given that Versace bi