2002-2003:

Cambridge held the 2003 Universities' Bridge Festival on February 8th and 9th.  It was a great success, with over 40 players from all over the country taking part.  The results of the pairs are here.  Well done to James Chapman, Andrew Bamford, Toby Kenney, Gareth Birdsall, Geraint Harker, Rob Richardson and especially Mike Scanlon for organising it.

In the Portland Bowl, Cambridge B (Geraint Harker, James Chapman, Stuart Haring, Jon DeSouza, Alex Foley and Roger Brown) are through to the semi-finals (to be played on the 25-26th April), where they will play Durham A, having beaten LSE A and Balliol A en route.  Cambridge B (Gareth Birdsall, Ian Greig, Toby Kenney, Teymur Tahseen, Andrew Bamford and Daniel Elstein) were knocked out by Durham A in the quarter-finals, having beaten London A and Balliol B.

The 2003 Varsity Match and Undergraduate Varsity Match were played at the St. John's Wood Bridge Club in London on March 1st and 2nd.  Cambridge (Gareth Birdsall, Ian Greig, Toby Kenney, Teymur Tahseen, Andrew Bamford and Daniel Elstein) won the Varsity Match by 70 IMPs over 96 boards.  The Undergraduate Varsity Match was played as a 3 teams of 4 match due to Oxford being unable to field a full team because of illness.  The scores were Cambridge A +64 IMPs, Oxford -12 IMPs, Cambridge B -52 IMPs, which gave overall victory to Cambridge (Alex Foley, Andrew Murphy, Jon DeSouza, Tom Slater, David Collier, David Hodge, Yin Lim and Jon Sharp).

We didn't do very well in the Eastern Counties League.  But we did put out a C Team for every match.  It's not the winning that counts etc...

Here are the latest UBC results (for what they're worth) and here is how Cuppers is progressing.

Andrew Bamford has represented England at Under 25 level, and Jon DeSouza has played for the Under 20s.

2001-2002:

The 2002 President's Teams was held in Emmanuel College on Saturday 20th April. The winners were Jonathan Green, Chris Chambers, Jonathan Mestel and Paul Barden, who achieved the fine score of 113 IMPs. More detailed results are here.

In the Portland Bowl, Cambridge A (Gareth Birdsall, Ian Greig, Roger Brown, Daniel Elstein, Teymur Tahseen and Toby Kenney) and Cambridge B (Mark Goddard, Andrew Bamford, Suzanna Morton, Geraint Harker and James Chapman) met in the semi-final, which Cambridge A won by over 100 IMPs. The final against Oxford A was very close, and we were 9 IMPs up going into the final set, but then everything went wrong for us and we lost the set by 35 IMPs, so that Oxford won by 26. In the 3rd place playoff Cambridge B lost narrowly to London A. On the way to the semis Cambridge A beat LSE A, Imperial A and Warwick A, whilst Cambridge B beat London B and Durham A. Trinity College (Andy De Souza, Jonathan Monroe, David Hodge, David Collier, James Sheppard & Ivan Ivanov) entered a separate team for the first time and reached the quarter-finals, beating Imperial B and LSE B, before losing to London A.

The University teams again failed to distinguish themselves in the Eastern Counties League, though we did manage to put out a C team for all but one match, which we have not been able to do for the last few years.  In terms of performance, the only consolation is that the A team failed to come bottom of the table. Detailed ECL results for the CUBC teams are here, and the overall results can be found here.

A team including Gareth Birdsall and Sonia Zakrzewski has won the County Teams Knockout for the second successive year.  Toby Kenney (Teymur Tahseen, Andy De Souza, Jonathan Monroe) beat Dominic Pinto (Konrad Scheffler, Jonathan Paxman, Michael Shuter) in the final of the County Teams Plate.

Gareth Birdsall has represented England at Under 25 level, and Roger Brown has played for the Under 20s.

If you want to know who's done well at the UBC on Thursdays, then the results are here, but given the muppetry involved I wouldn't take them too seriously. Trinity 3 won Cuppers, which was finished for a record-breaking second year in succession (well done Toby!).

2000-2001:

Cambridge (Gareth Birdsall, Sonia Zakrzewski, Ian Greig, Jonathan Worters, Daniel Elstein and Jeremy Fialko, npc Alastair Flutter) won the 2001 Varsity Match, in the end by the convincing margin of 232 IMPs to 157, losing the first two sets but then imposing themselves by winning the next nine. In the Undergraduate Varsity Match, Cambridge (Toby Kenney, Jonathan Monroe, Mark Goddard, Rob Richardson, Andrew Bamford, Geraint Harker, Andy De Souza and Michal Vine) ran away with it to win by over 100 IMPs.

In the Portland Bowl Cambridge B (Toby Kenney, Teymur Tahseen, Suzanna Morton, Mark Goddard, Geraint Harker and Andrew Bamford) did well to reach the semi-finals, where they lost narrowly (134 IMPs to 102) to Oxford A, and also unfortunately lost 58-49 to Durham A in the 3rd place playoff. Cambridge A (Gareth Birdsall, Sonia Zakrzewski, Ian Greig, Jonathan Worters, Daniel Elstein and Jeremy Fialko) also lost to Oxford A, but in the quarter-finals, as Oxford, who went on to win the competition again, gained some revenge for the Varsity Match.

The University teams were somewhat unsuccessful in the Eastern Counties League, but the A team did at least manage to win its last three matches.

In the 2001 Garden Cities Trophy a University Club Team (Gareth Birdsall, Rachel Wade, Michael Ashe, Gerard Thompson, Sonia Zakrzewski, Tony Kelly, Ian Greig, Jon Green, Suzanna Cohen, Dafydd Jones and Jonathan Worters) got all the way to the national final, finishing a very creditable 5th, having defeated a strong Cambridge Bridge Club team to win the local qualifying round, and then coming 2nd in the Midlands regional final.

In the County Teams Knockout a (non-university) team including Sonia Zakrzewski and Gareth Birdsall managed to win, beating Ian Greig's team in the final.

1999-2000:

Cambridge (Gareth Birdsall, Rachel Wade, Ian Greig, Sonia Zakrzewski, Dan Faber and Ben Zalin) won the 2000 Varsity Match.  In the Undergraduate Varsity Match Cambridge (Harold Bergson, James Pfeffer, Jeremy Fialko, Daniel Elstein, Toby Kenney, Teymur Tahseen, Suzanna Morton and Yale Zhang) also won easily.

In the Portland Bowl Cambridge A lost the final to Oxford A by 114 IMPs to 76.

1998-1999:

Cambridge (Zivan, Kelly, Birdsall, Wade, Zalin and O'Gorman, npc Cooke) won the 1999 Varsity Match by over 100 IMPs. In the Undergraduate Varsity Match Cambridge lost by 2 IMPs.

In the Portland Bowl Cambridge A (Zivan, Kelly, Birdsall, O'Gorman, Zakrzewski and Greig, npc Cooke) faced Cambridge B (Faber, Grisdale, Schmidt, Bergson, Fialko and Keevash, npc Ashe) in the semi-finals. Cambridge A won a hard fought encounter by 25 IMPs and went on to comfortably beat Bristol in the final. Cambridge B, meanwhile, lost to Edinburgh (including ex-Cambridge player Graham Hazel) in the 3rd place playoff.

To complete the 'treble' of University bridge the A team won the Eastern Counties League.

At the EBU Easter Congress , Gareth Birdsall and Dan Faber won the U25 Pairs (Jon Green and Ian Greig finishing 3rd) while Suzanna Morton won the U19 Pairs playing with her brother.

In the 1999 Garden Cities Trophy a University Club team (Leslie, Shaw, Hornung, Thompson, Zakrzewski, Greig, Faber and Grisdale) finished second to a strong Cambridge Bridge Club team in the local qualifying round.

A number of past and present Cambridge players were present at the 1999 World Junior Pairs Championships held in Nymburk, the Czech Republic, over the Summer. Most successful were Hazel and Green who finished 13th.

1997-1998:

Oxford won the 1998 Varsity Match, pulling back 30 IMPS on the last set. The Cambridge team was Hazel, Green, Zivan, Zalin, Birdsall and Wade (npc Flutter). In the 1997-8 Portland Bowl Cambridge B (Wade, Birdsall, Greig, Keevash, S. Zakrzewski and Faber, npc Mike Ashe and Gerard Thompson) beat Cambridge A (Zivan, Zalin, J.Zakrzewski and Grisedale - Hazel and Green were absent representing Great Britain in Italy) in the semi-finals. In the finals Cambridge B lost to Oxford; Cambridge A beat Durham (including Robin Michaels) in the 3rd place playoff.

Graham Hazel and Jon Green (with Suzanne Cohen, Paula Leslie, David Bakshi and Martin Jones) won a bronze medal at the EU Junior Championships at Salsomaggiore in Italy.

Rob Schmidt and Kam Wing Fung won the 1998 EBU National Newcomers Pairs. At the 1998 EBU Easter Congress, Graham Hazel and Jon Green won the U25 Pairs, Harold Bergson won the U19 Pairs playing with McCrossen, and Gareth Birdsall and Dan Faber won the non-expert prize in the Championship Pairs

In the 1998 Garden Cities Trophy the Cambridge Bridge Club reversed their previous year's narrow defeat at the hands of the University in the local finals.

1996-1997:

Oxford won the 1997 Varsity Match. I don't have any details of this, other than that Cambridge (Hazel, Green, Zivan, Flutter, Ashment, Waddington) had a large lead after one day's play but not after two.... In the Portland Bowl, Cambridge A (as above) lost to Oxford B in the quarter-finals. Meanwhile Cambridge B (Zalin, Smith, Zakrzewski, Boyle) reached the quarter-finals courtesy of a couple of closely-fought wins by default, and then disposed of Newcastle A to reach the last four. They went down to Edinburgh in the semis, but then exacted revenge in the third-place play-off against Oxford B (who had come close to beating Oxford A in the other semi), winning by a large margin.

In the Garden Cities Trophy the University progressed to the regional finals, beating Cambridge Bridge Club narrowly in the local finals.

The final of the Cambs and Hunts County Teams Knockout was be between Julian Foster's team (Woodruff, Ashment, Waddington) and Jon Green's team (Flutter, Hazel, Zalin), with the winners qualifying to play in the Pachabo Trophy.