Nick FitzGibbon and Adam Mesbur won the National Master Pairs championship at Templeogue, Dublin at the weekend. The pair, who have been playing in partnership since the early 1970s, winning European championship medals at junior, open and senior levels, took control of the tournament early in the second session and pulled away to win by a wide margin.
With victory virtually assured with two rounds to play, they stretched their lead further in the penultimate round to go 31 points ahead with one match remaining. They needed a big lead because in a dramatic final match, the north Dublin pair of Pat Cassidy and Billy Ronan surprised the champions by defeating them 18-2 to take second place overall for a career-best finish. However, the winners were still left with almost 19 points to spare to take their fifth masters’ title in partnership and FitzGibbon’s sixth as he had also won it with another partner.
Fred Barry, Paul Porteous and Wojciech Gorczyca, Marcin Rudzinski also had big last-round results to move up to third and fourth respectively, Peter Goodman, Dan McIntosh were fifth, with Tom Gilligan and Dave Terry in sixth. Juniors Luca Crone and Matthew O’Farell had another excellent result in top-level company and finished ninth overall to take the prize for best regional masters. Bill O’Hanlon and Tony Ward from Tullamore were best area masters. Session prizes went to James Heneghan, Karel De Raeymaeker; Helen and Brendan Sheridan; Hugh McDermott, Denis Mortell. A total of 83 pairs competed.
More than 1,500 players in 41 centres throughout the country took part in the Celtic Nations’ Simultaneous Pairs competitions last week, the biggest turnout of any of the participating countries. Junior bridge will benefit from the proceeds. The best Irish daily scores recorded were as follows (locations refer to participating centres not necessarily players’ home clubs): Monday: 1. Nicola O’Dowd, Dara Voyles (Declan Byrne Bridge, Dublin) 74.60 per cent; Tuesday: 1. David Scannell, Eoin MacNeill (Galway virtual) 71.79; Wednesday: 1. Katherine Lennon, Johanne Powell (Galway virtual) 71.58; Thursday: 1. Paddy Byrne, Mary Clancy (Fermoy) 69.41.
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Dublin’s Regent Bridge Club will host the annual open team tournament for the Wigoder cup on New Year’s Day and the open intermediate grade pairs competition for the Doreen Cairnduff trophy on Monday, January 2nd. For details see the club’s website.
