Playing their cards right has turned a North-East bridge club into a big success. David Roberts asks players to show their hand and reveal the secrets of the game.

TUCKED away between used car dealerships and factories in Darlington sits St George’s Bridge Centre.

From the outside it is an unprepossessing building in dirty red brick, with only a small sign to give a clue as to what purpose it serves.

Even the centre manager, Beverley Godfrey, admits the building’s exterior is not its strong point.

“Whatever you do, don’t take a picture of the outside,” she tells The Northern Echo photographer as he unpacks his gear.

But despite its uninviting facade, the centre is a hub of activity and can lay a claim to being one of the best-supported clubs in Darlington.

Each week, 300 to 350 people meet there to play bridge.

As Clive Owen, the highest-ranking bridge player in the North-East and one of the club’s stalwarts, points out, it is unlikely that so many people play rugby in the town.

The fact that a card game can inspire such levels of interest does surprise people. Beverley tells the story of a delivery driver who was dropping off some stationery and asked what went on at the centre. She was met with disbelief when she told him that people met there to play bridge.

“He just said ‘what you just sit around and play cards?’ I’m sure he thought it was a brothel or something,” she laughs.

This centre is celebrating its tenth anniversary and is holding an open day this weekend to attract even more people to a game which has been popularised by everybody from actors, to authors, to tycoons.

The building became home to three bridge clubs – Darlington, Hurworth and Long Newton – after members agreed that, rather than use rented premises, where the card tables and equipment had to be put away after each session, they would find a building that could be used for the sole purpose of playing bridge.

Money for the project was raised by selling shares to people in the town.

Originally, a building at Durham Tees Valley Airport, near the St George hotel, was chosen as a suitable home for the bridge players, but council planning restrictions meant it could not be used.

By then the company name was already listed as St George, and when the present building was found, the name stuck.

The bridge centre was originally a “spit and sawdust” pub known as the Old Alex, before being taken over by the former Darlington and Simpson Rolling Mills steelworks and converted into management offices and dining rooms.

The wood-panelled former dining rooms are laid out with card tables, and there is a small library devoted to the game. Then, there is a bar, to which members retire to discuss the night’s action after a game. There is also a classroom where beginners can learn the rules and skills needed.

Upstairs, the former offices are used as competition rooms, with tables and seats for spectators, and an office for Beverley.

It is in Beverley’s office that scores are calculated and Master Points accumulated, which give the rankings of the individual bridge players.

At Darlington Bridge Club, duplicate contract bridge is played. It is a hard game to explain briefly to the uninitiated – reams have been written on the subject.

Comedian Woody Allen had his own description.

“Having sex is like playing bridge,”

he said. “If you don’t have a good partner, you’d better have a good hand.”

Essentially, two sets of partners, without seeing each others’ cards, try to work out what is in their partner’s hand, while trying to outbid the other couple.

In duplicate contract bridge, all the tables play the same hands so everyone is on an equal footing and each person is tested on how they deal with the cards they are holding.

Although the Master Points rank each player, Beverley says the game is as much about the social side as the competition. On club nights, the bar is as likely to be as full as the competition rooms, with players thrashing out their mistakes and recounting their triumphs over a pint or a glass of wine.

Beverley got into the game by chance after starting work at the bridge centre as a parttime barmaid. When players tried to involve her in their conversation about the game, she decided she had better learn and is now hooked.

“I like to think I can play enough so I can hold my own in conversations,” she says. “A lot of people still think it is played by the upper echelons, but anyone from a taxi driver to a teacher can play the game so long as they can count from one to 40 and add two numbers together.

“What I like about bridge is you can be as competitive as you like. You can sit and play round a kitchen table with three other friends and a bottle of wine, or you can take part in competitions.”

The centre has had its share of success: four members play on the England under-25s team.

And the oldest member of the club is 87, showing the game’s enduring appeal.

“We have members who have trouble getting out of their cars and crossing the car park, but have no problem beating much younger opponents,”

says Beverley.

Research has shown that youngsters who learn bridge at school work much better in the classroom, with improved concentration and behaviour.

The evidence is so compelling that in Holland, bridge is part of the curriculum and the English Bridge Union and the Government have set up a working party to look at the findings.

The US’s two richest men, Bill Gates and investor Warren Buffet, who are both keen bridge players, have invested £720,000 in programmes to teach bridge in schools.

In fact, there’s much more to the game than meets the eye, says Clive Owen. “It’s not just about the arithmetic and the counting, it’s also about communicating with your partner.

“It’s like an international language: it doesn’t matter where you are, you can find a bridge club and everybody’s more or less speaking the same language.”

*Pictured, from left, are Mary Applegarth, Margaret Phillips, Bob Applegarth and Linda Davison.

■ St George’s Bridge Centre, in Whessoe Road, Darlington, is holding its Bridge Awareness Day tomorrow, from 10am to 4pm.

Anyone is welcome to drop in and try a game.

Bridge classes will start at the centre from Monday, February 2.

For more details, call Beverley Godfrey on 01325-360340 or visit stgeorgesbridge.co.uk