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Twelves players (3 pairs of boys and 3 pair of girls) will represent Uganda in the Bridge game at the 2022 FISU Mind Sports Championship in Belgium.
They qualified for the final tournament after emerging victorious in the Bridge competition at the 1st AUUS Mind Sports Championship held at Makerere University last month.
The pair of Joshua Opoka and Isaac Bua won the Boys championship after having accumulated the most match points to beat off Abdunoor Ssebbi and Florent Mando’s pair while Benedict Hangiriza and Benjamin Openyto pair finished third.
Joshua Opoka (north) and partner Isaac Bua (South) emerged the champions while Benedict Hangiriza (east) and Benjamin Openyto (west) pair came 3rd at the 1st AUUS Mind Sports Championship Bridge tournament that was held at Makerere University last month | Courtesy Photo.
All those three pairs secured their slots at the games in Belgium.
Just like the boys, the girls will be represented by Bellandonna Namata and Anitah Nakyazze pair who won the AUUS championship with 98 points. They will be joined by Ruth Bamugalagire and Janat Namata pair (who finished second) plus Anitah Akampurira and Ninah Kamukama pair ( who finished third)
Belladonna Namata ( west, front right) and Anitah Nakayenze ( east) emerged the best in the 1st AUUS Mind Sports Championship, bridge section with an astonishing 98 match points to beat off their competition | Courtesy Photo.
The 2022 FISU Mind Sports Championship will take place in Antwerp, Belgium between 12-17 September 2022.
About Bridge game
Bridge is a card game played by four people in two competitive partnerships, with partners sitting opposite each other around a table.
It originated from Britain in the 16th century and is one of the most popular card games in the world.
This game is very popular in Europe, North America, Australia and fairly played in South America and Asia while it’s rare in Africa.
They are many variants of bridge but Contact (rubble) bridge and Duplicate bridge are the most common.
The World Bridge Federation (WBF) is the governing body for international competitive bridge, with numerous other bodies governing bridge at the regional level.
Dan Isabirye and Patrick Ssebuliba have played a huge role to see that Bridge is played in Universities across Uganda. Isabirye is the Mind Sports Association of Uganda games director and President while Ssebuliba is the Head of Sports Department at Victoria University.
How it’s played
The game is played using cards without jokers, with a deck of cards consisting of four suits ( Spades, Hearts, Diamonds and Clubs). There are 13 cards in each suits and each player is dealt thirteen cards from a deck.
The objective of this game is to win as many tricks as possible out of the 13 possible tricks in a hand with each trick consisting of one card played by each player.
After the cards have been dealt, bidding takes place. A bid is a call a player makes stating the number of tricks he intends to win during the auctioning ( bidding) stage of bridge.
The objective of the players during bidding is to reach a contract that suits their combined hands even when they don’t know the cards their partner has.
When bidding, successive bids must be higher than previous ones, a bidder who can’t raise the bid simply says “pass” such that the bidding process moves to the next person in clockwise direction.
Bidding stops when three consecutive no bids are called ( after a bid or no bid made) or when the highest possible bid is reached.
The first card played to a trick is the lead and each player in rotation must play a card of the same suit
At the end of the game, the pair of the most match points wins the game.
Part of information in this article has been gathered from Mr. Walusimbi Herman Solomon and Patrick Ssebuliba.
