The Gazette Cup is the Manchester County qualifier for the national Teams of Eight competition - the Garden Cities Trophy. 

The winners will represent Manchester County in the final in the summer.

Traditionally, Manchester Bridge Club has entered more teams in the Gazette Cup than any other club in the county - and we'd like that tradition to continue in 2025.

Please mark the day in your calendar.

If you are interested in playing then let me know by email or register via the entry form below. 

Please don't worry about forming your team as the Committee can help once we can assess interest.

Please enter the format is a lot of fun and played in a friendly but competitive spirit.

If you have any questions, please email me or call me.

Thank you very much

Paul Murray

Chairman

The Manchester Bridge Club

We will be running a celebratory duplicate on Wednesday evening 15th January to show our appreciation for Jeff Morris and his very significant support for Manchester Bridge Club over 50 years.  Jeff gave up a secure job 50 years ago to take over the management of the Central Bridge Club which he transformed into Manchester Bridge Club.  Jeff ran and owned Manchester Bridge Club for many years, one of the few private bridge clubs in the country.  The Club attracted many expert bridge players.  More recently we have become a members club and Jeff is still a very active member of our Committee.  More details to follow very shortly.

 Nicholas's seminar on Suit Preference Signals is taking place later this week on Friday 10th January 2025.  The start time is 10.30am and will finish at approximately 12.30pm.  As usual there will be notes of the seminar and copies of the 8 example hands.  This topic is suitable for both improvers and intermediates and for more experienced players who want some revision on the main suit preference signals.  You do not need a partner to attend this seminar.

If you will be attending this seminar please either add your name to the list below or email me via grasan30@gmail.com.

Below is a list of all the seminars we have arranged with Nicholas for the winter/spring 2025 period.  We have tried to provide topics which reflect the feedback we have received so these next seminars are mainly on defence and declarer play.  There will also be a couple of seminars on Sunday afternoons in later January/February on Two Over One for intermediates and more experienced players.

Any further ideas for topics please email me.  Finally - thanks to Anne Jerrold for all her work on helping to arrange these seminars.

Regards Susan (Triggs)

Friday 10th January - Suit Preference Signals

Friday 14th February - Tactics for Declarer when playing a NT Contract

Friday 14th March - Surround Play

Friday 11th April - Improve your defence in a NT contract

There will be further seminars on Friday 9th May and Friday 13th June - please email grasan30@gmail.com with any suggestions for topics

On Sunday we held our traditional Manchester Bridge Club Santa Claus Pairs.

As usual, the SCP attracted a large field (62 players this year) including several of the very best players in the country. Under Jeff Smith's expert direction we played 2 sessions of 18 Boards with the final result coming down to the very last hand as Stuart Shalom and Daniel Kelsall were pipped at the post by David Sarabowski and Eve Lighthill in the tightest of finishes.   

The Committee had a busy morning setting up the rooms, laying out the tables with Xmas crackers and chocolates and setting up a mince pies and mulled wine station - and all this before the caterers arrived at the half way point to set out an excellent buffet. 

As usual there was a best Santa jumper prize - won by Lesley Richards in a high quality field - and lots of festive raffle prizes.

In summary, over 6 hours of play, a good time was had by all in a seasonal and festive atmosphere. 

Happy Christmas everyone! Hope to see you all at the Club in 2025! 

We are delighted to announce that the following Member of the Club achieved an EBU Master Point ranking promotion in November 

Stuart Shalom  Premier Regional Master
Tessa Connolly  Master
Ron Butler  County Master
Carole Gavin  Club Master


Congratulations to all 4     

Beginners Bridge Taster Courses.

If you are interested in joining one of our future courses, (likely to start March 2025) please fill in the form below and we will keep you updated about our plans for our next courses.

Please be careful when you enter your email address. There have been a couple of incorrect email addresses entered so if you have not had a reply please try again.  You will always receive a personal response in 24 hours. 

Each course will last 10 weeks and covers the basics of play and bidding. We teach the 5 card major, strong No Trump and short club system.  We will also cover basic defensive tactics.

Most importantly, the classes will be friendly and sociable. Bridge can be a complicated game and will stretch your mind, but we aim to make bridge fun to learn and hope you will quickly come to love the game as much as we do.  Once your course is finished we have a wide range of supported, follow on sessions for you to join to continue to learn this wonderful game.

The course will cost £80 payable in advance 

Interested?  Find out more by emailing Susan on grasan30@gmail.com or completing the online form below

We now have three IntoBridge sessions each week.  These are on a Monday and Friday afternoon at 2pm and on Thursday evening (Swiss Pairs) starting at 7.15pm.  All these sessions are well supported and will continue.  The Manchester Bridge Club Committee decided that we would have to cancel the Sunday afternoon session because there have been so few people playing on a Sunday in recent weeks.

We now have supervised sessions for beginners, learners & improvers at the club:

Monday afternoon at 1pm for Improvers with Paul Murray.

** NEW** Monday evening at 7:15pm for beginners with Frank/Chris

Tuesday evening at 7pm all levels with Nicholas

Thursday morning at 10:30 for beginners with Susan Triggs.

Members £6 & Visitors £8

Everyone is welcome

Please be aware that the BridgeWebs attendance Module is not a real time system. It reflects entry fees spent on online and face-to-face games but does not reflect money paid into your online account until it is manually updated from the Club's bank statement. Our 'WebMaster', Dave Fernley performs these updates periodically- usually weekly. If you need to know your balance between updates, call Paul or Dave.

The new Bridgewebs Attendance Module for tracking payment money for online games is now live.

It provides you with a real-time view of the games you have played, the current balance of your account and payments made and received by your account. 

To see this information you will need to log on to the Members Only area of the website and then select thePayments Account tab.
Detailed instructions logging onto this area are available here

A detailed description of the Online Account, how it works, etc, is also available here within the Members Only Area (log-on needed).

Account statements will also be sent out periodically by email. This ensures that people who choose not to actively monitor their account balance are still aware of it. The statement provides a regular update to non-members who play in our online games who do not have access the member's area and therefore the real time benefits of this system.

See Calendar on the right of this home page for our Weekly Schedule

Face to Face table fees for Duplicates at the Club are £4 for fully paid-up MBC members & £6 for Guests

Supervised Face to Face table fees at the Club are £6 for fully paid-up MBC members & £8 for Guests

(includes free tea/coffee & biscuits and occasional treats! However, sandwiches/supper will not be served)

Online bridge entry is £3.75 for members & £4.50 for non-members

For Online games a pre-arranged partner is preferable. However, if possible, partners can be found after you log on to our tournaments. Just wait on Partnership Desk on IntoBridge. 

Please transfer entry fee (or more for convenience / multiple games) into the MBC bank account (see below).

MBC will reduce your balance after each session played and email you with a regular statement to help you stay in credit.

The Manchester Bridge Club Bank details are –

Natwest Sort Code 01-02-02   Account Number  21867577

Please put your First Name and Surname as the payment reference

Thank you for supporting The Manchester Bridge Club