Defending champions ITC bounced Trambak Rubber 138-61 in three rounds to set up a title clash with Tolani International Grand Prix winners India Blues, who accounted for the other Bengal team Teloijian Tea Company.

The day's honours belong to ITC (Kalpana Mishra, Anand Mehta, Anil Padhye, Subhash Gupta, Shibnath Sarkar, Badal Das). Their march to the top place in the quarter-final league unchallenged, ITC ran up a massive 88 IMPs lead over Trambak in the first two rounds. Surely, Trambak were not pinning hopes on yet another trade-mark comeback to get out of this hole? A bleak team-member Ajay Brahmachari admitted as much during the break.

But the Bengal team did not give up. Yet. Swinging play was their chosen remedy, and aggressive (over?)bids flew thick and fast. Sometimes they work, sometimes they don't, as Trambak discovered, ending the round trailing 61-138. They threw in the towel.

India Blues also had an easy time against Teloijian, especially in the backdrop of the struggle they waged to get into the last-four. Blues (Ashok Ruia, JM Shah, K Venkatraman, Jitu Solani, Kamal Mukherjee, Ashok Goel), floundering at sixth place after the penultimate round, notched 23 VPs in the seventh to trail Dr Tolani by two points. But whoever invented the ten per cent commission came to their rescue. A 2.65 VPs carryover (10 per cent of the surplus in the qualifying round) took them past Dr Tolani. Whew!

Tolani must surely think this their foulest day. The coup by India Blues pales in comparison to what Trambak did to them. Trambak (Hari Shankar Bajoria, JP Ghosh, S Saha, S Basak, Ajay Bramhachari, S Majumdar) went into the final quarter-final league round, against Tolani, trailing them by 8 VPs. Bidding was aggressive on both sides, as witnessed inthis second round hand:

Trambak bid four hearts and won, thanks to an error by the defending Tolani pair (A heart lead was not overtaken by Ace). In the open room , Tolani's auction was 5 clubs, and they went down. But Tolani inched back, and the two teams were level going into the 10th round a part game. Trambak closed, and held, two diamonds and two spades in either room to notch six crucial IMPs. Score for the round? 19-11. Trambak had drawn level. And because of that 10 per cent rule again, inched ahead by 0.33! Bramhachari said, ``It was the part games that helped us.''

Results

Semifinals:

ITC bt Trambak 138-61; India Blues bt Teloijian 103-76. QF league standings:

1. ITC 119.35; 2. Teloijian 117.55; 3. India Blues 112.65; 4. Trambak Rubber 112.33; 5. Dr Tolani 112; 6. Jimmy Mehta 102.95; 7. Khandelwal 90.85; 8. Pankaj Kapadia 76.75