USA-2 Moves to Semifinals in Venice Cup The world team championships in Bali, Indonesia, have reached the semifinal stage. In the Venice Cup, USA-2 (Disa Eythorsdottir, Janice Seamon-Molson, Jill Levin, Jenny Wolpert, Jill Meyers and Migry Zur-Campanile) defeated Poland in the 96-board quarterfinal by 173 international match points to 125. USA-1 (Barbara Sonsini, Judi Radin, Lynn Deas, Beth Palmer, Irina Levitina and Kerri Sanborn) lost to England by 65 imps. In the semifinals, USA-2 will take on the Netherlands and England will play China, who put out the defending champions, France. The USA-1 Bermuda Bowl team (Kevin Bathurst, Kevin Dwyer, John Kranyak, Gavin Wolpert, Bobby Levin and Steve Weinstein) beat Canada by 55.3 imps and will play Monaco next. The other semi is between Italy and Poland, who eliminated the reigning champions from the Netherlands. USA-2 (Martin Fleisher, Mike Kamil, Zia Mahmood, Chip Martel, Michael Rosenberg and Chris Willenken) just failed in a bid to qualify for the quarterfinals. In the d'Orsi Senior Trophy, USA-2 (Carolyn Lynch, Mike Passell, Roger Bates, Garey Hayden, Marc Jacobus and Eddie Wold) defeated Scotland by 149 imps and will meet Poland in the semifinals. The second match is between France, the defending champions, and Germany. The USA-1 senior team (Richie Schwartz, Allan Graves, Neil Chambers, John Schermer, Bob Hamman and Sam Lev) suffered a heartbreaking loss to Poland in the last qualifying round. Along with an unlikely parley of results in other matches, USA-1 failed to qualify by less than one victory point. The diagramed deal from the England-USA-1 Venice Cup match contains an instructive point. Both Souths were in three no-trump. At one table, Fiona Brown (East for England) passed over North's one-spade opening. But Palmer (East) made the normal-looking takeout double. These decisions had a critical effect on the play. When Sanborn was declarer, she put up dummy's heart queen. East took the trick and returned a heart. South won with her king and followed the percentage play in diamonds: low to dummy's ace and low to her king. When West discarded a club, declarer led another diamond. East won, cashed the heart jack and spade ace, and played another heart for down one. Nevena Senior (South) had seen East make a takeout double, which indicated short spades and length in the other three suits. So declarer, after taking the third trick with her heart king, led a diamond to dummy's ace, then played a diamond to her jack. When the finesse won, as South was confident it would, she claimed her contract. Plus 50 and plus 400 gave England 10 imps on the board. Results are at worldbridge.org. Play can be watched at bridgebase.com.