My friend Neil Mendoza and I had a great finish to 2017 when we won the Portland Club’s annual Auction Pairs (which is always a highlight of my year). I can’t pretend we had any real expectation of winning, but a combination of good luck, good play and flawless bidding by Neil meant we scooped the £8,000 jackpot (actually we only got half, as Stuart Wheeler had bought 50 per cent of us).