Daily Times

LAHORE: Pakistan bridge stars are all prepared and ready to demonstrate their intellectual might during the four-day Balijee Bridge International Bridge Championship that commences at Lahore Gymkhana Club here on Thursday (today). This championship is supported by Aijaz Ahmad (Yummy Products), who holds the event in a grand way in memory of his late father Muhammad Iqbal, popularly known as Balijee amongst the bridge playing community of Pakistan.

The champions from Karachi, Islamabad, Rawalpindi, Abbotabad and Lahore will vie for top honours and ample cash prizes in the pairs event on the opening day and the team event on the remaining days. And all through these four days of fierce competition the men of prominence, who have shown their prowess consistently inside and outside the country, will be all out to lash out at the opposition through brilliant bidding and dummy play that will flatten those trying to undo the superb ones. Interestingly, there is one player from India who is participating and a couple from Kuwait but with the accomplished ones of Pakistan on the bridge tables the class in adept moves will be visible all through the four days of the championship. Undoubtedly, our own players have loads of ability and substance and are determined to captivate the occasion through a constant quality in competitive play.

Over the past week, the organizing team at Lahore Gymkhana, headed by Ihsan Qadir, and with back up from the Committee of Management and the Convener Card Room, Khawaja Imran Zubair, the playing arena looks adequately facilitating to the players whose minds and hearts will be under stress over the four days of the championship. The players from Karachi who arrived last evening were simply stunned by the arrangements; after all they are going to spend hours and hours concentrating on their enemy ousting moves over the four days.

To facilitate the timely and accurate flow of results, the Pakistan Bridge Federation has provided Bridge Mate Technology now in use throughout the bridge playing countries, and with this technology it will be possible to update scores as well as advising the line up of the next round thus saving considerable time and ensuring correctness of the draw. The fancied teams are many and include Hadis comprising bridge masters like Khurshid Hadi, Kamal Shoaib, AR Allana, Javed Miran, Rashid ul Ghazi and Imran Jhaka and then there are Bilals, Aces, Holdem and Izzo. The gracious women of this event are Rubina Agha, Fatima Raza, Najm Abid, Shahnaz Peerzada, Goga Saeed, Tahira Nasir, Tahira Liaqat and many more. The formal opening will be by Aijaz Ahmed of Yummy at 9:45 am at the Gymkhana Card Room.