ITC capitalised on three crucial errors by India Blues in the third round to win the final 137-117. Captain Anand Mehta said after the match, ``The win gives me great pleasure as India Blues is a very fine team. Our Bengal pair in particular played well. The arrival of Subhash Gupta from Delhi midway through the competition also lifted the team.''

ITC, comprising Anand Mehta, Kalpana Mishra, Shibnath Sarkar, Badal Das, Anil Padhye and Subhash Gupta, pocketed the prize money of Rs 50,000. India Blues (Ashok Ruia, JM Shah, Jitu Solani, Kamal Mukherjee, K Venkatraman) were richer by Rs 25,000.

Honours were even after two rounds (16 boards per round) in the four-round final. ITC took the lead 40-27 in the first, but India Blues won the second 35-25 to trail by three IMPs.

At that stage,Anand Mehta was philosophical about his team's chances. He chose a cricketing analogy, suggesting perhaps, how closely he follows son-in-law Sachin Tendulkar's fortunes. ``We have had a good run till now. But bridge is like one-day cricket, anybody could win on any day. Moreover, this final is not like an Australia-Zimbabwe tie where the results are relatively predictable.''

But at the end of the third round, Mehta could almost scent victory, and chose that moment to distribute sweets to celebrate grand-daughter Sara's first birthday, on October 12.

ITC won that round 51-28 to widen their lead to 26. 42 of those 51 IMPs came in three boards, the 13th, the 15th and the 16th. A bidding mishap saw India Blues settle for four hearts in the closed room on the 13th board, while Das and Sarkar made six hearts in the open room, that fetched 13 IMPs for ITC. On the 16th board, Ashok Ruia and K Venkatraman went one down in their six spades contract, while Kalpana Mishra and Anil Padhye, recently winner of thezonals at Johannesburg, made five spades. ITC's tally swelled by 13 more IMPs.

But the crucial 15th board (see box) made all the difference. Stall bids by Anil Padhye (three hearts) and Kalpana Mishra (four hearts) forced Shah and Solani to close six diamonds. One down. In the open room, the Bengal pair made a six clubs contract. Analysing the hand, JM Shah said, ``we lost 16 IMPs on this deal, a big swing. The second stall bid by Kalpana did not afford us the space to switch to clubs.'' India Blues tried a comeback by changing pairs, but could just manage a 27-21 win in the final round. It was not enough.