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Basic question, but undiscussed


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Here is the start of an auction:

Pass 1 Pass 1

1NT

 

Now as it happened, the 1NT was inexplicable as the bidder had spades only. My pard de jour suggested it was probably a misclick and I expect she is right. But let's assume that the 1NT shows diamonds and spades. What would double be by the next hand?

 

Pass 1 Pass 1

1NT X

 

Often a double against a two-suited take-out is played as the ability to punish at least one of the suits. But we are at the one level, the doubler will not have either great spade length or great diamond length. Three card support of hearts seems to me to be a more reasonable use of the double.

 

In the auction I give, the first round pass makes it clear that the NT is for take-out (despite the peculiarity on this particular board) but a fair number of people play a sandhich so that even the 1NT in the auction 1 Pass 1 1NT is for take-out. Again I would think that a support double is of more use than a penalty oriented double.

 

 

We had a bad result here, not really related to this issue, but I am not looking to assess responsibility. We had never discussed the meaning of a double, and I think that I have never discussed it with most other partners either. So suppose I now plan to discuss it. You recommend?

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Being allergic to support doubles I've just used it to show the balanced 18-19 on the theory that something pretty well defined like this could be crucial to partners next bid ie. if they bounce in a suit or if pard can hit the runout with marginal values and no game ambitions. Partner can also cue a stopper with otherwise modest values that are now in the game range.

 

Not a lot of thought went into this so I'm sure there are better options.

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If you play support X's, I think this is a clear support double situation. If you don't play support doubles, it makes sense to show a strong NT hand with a double as ggwhiz suggested. Otherwise how can you show that hand? Rebidding 2NT might be uncomfortable when opp showed 2 suits and his partner would be on the lead.
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