Last weekend (12–14 March), the 2009/2010 season of the second division of the Polish Team Bridge Championships came to an end. The regular season was not particularly successful for our team. In 15 matches, BKB Prnjavor Bolesławiec won 6 times, suffered 8 defeats and drew once. This was enough for only 13th place. This meant that the Bolesławiec team was threatened with relegation from the second division. Fortunately, from that point onward, the Bolesławiec players went on a winning streak. In the relegation group, in which 4 teams played each other home and away, BKB Bolesławiec defeated all its opponents twice and earned the right to play in the playoff phase for survival.
The Bolesławiec team’s opponent in the fight to avoid relegation was the higher-ranked Kantory Progres Kędzierzyn–Koźle. After the regular season, the Kędzierzyn team was in 11th place. The Bolesławiec players began the match with a negative c-over 7.2 handicap, resulting from their lower position after the regular phase. As it later turned out, this had no significance. BKB Prnjavor recorded a decisive victory in the 72-board match, 173–116.2! Only in the first segment of the match (six segments of 12 boards each are played) did the opponents narrowly defeat BKB, 27–18. In the next five segments, our team first made up the deficit and then systematically extended its lead with every board, winning 28–27, 33–16, 37–6, 32–21 and 25–12. Thus, for the fourth time, our team will begin another season at second-division tables in October.
In the decisive match, BKB Prnjavor Bolesławiec played with: Antoni Ochot – Andrzej Kaźmierczak, Jarosław Molenda – Artur Winkler and Wiesław Tabiszewski – Lech Warężak. The following players also played during the season: Jerzy Olenderek, Marek Drecki and Sławomir Zimniak.
(information from BKB Prnjavor/ii)