bluecalm, on 2012-March-12, 02:45, said:
We discussed it too. I thought double should be for penalty while my partner wasn't sure.
The idea of the double is that it looks like we have at least balance of points and all the honors lay good for us (diamonds behind diamonds, spades behind spades) so it looks like they probably won't make.
This being polish club also gives a chance for 4-4 club fit (partner couldn't "raise" clubs after 2S).
Anyway I passed and we score +100 worth 59% of matchpoints (declarer lost a trick along the way).
Partner had: QJxx ATxx Jxx xx.
Our diamonds are not "behind" the diamonds, we have the KQ and LHO usually has a stiff or a doubleton. I think my diamond holding is very bad compared to the ace for both offense and defense, our 5 points may be worth nothing on defense, and they may get a ruff if we declare.
Likewise, I don't see a reason to think that we have spades behind the spades, we don't even know that partner has 4 spades and even if he does we do not know that he holds 2 honors.
Yes, we might find a 4-4 club fit, but again I am not even sure why we want to, we are vulnerable and have this poor diamond holding. At the end of the day having the balance of the points is not a convincing reason to me to bid to the 3 level vulnerable, or to want to defend 2S X when they have a long trump suit, and many of our honors look bad. Sometimes people with a 6-1 spade fit and 19 HCP make 2S, it is really not that surprising when we hold this hand.