[Furlan]

Scoring: XIMP

1♣ (1♥) X (4♥)
X (Pa) ??

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First X showed exactly 4 spades.

Scoring is Patton (IMPs + BAM).

[JLOGIC]

Edit: Sorry didn't realize this was the beginner/int forum.

The key thing to realize here is that double is not penalty. It shows a strong hand with short hearts generally. That means you have to pass if you have really good hearts and not much else, but you'll never have that on this auction so it's ok.

With 18-19 bal you will pretty much have to double though since you have so much values, unless your hand is extremely bad for partner pulling (like KQJ of hearts).

We clearly have to bid given that description, it's possible that 4H is cold and 5D is cold. If you bid 5D that's fine. If you're thinking "wow, we might have a slam" I don't think you're far off at all, but I wouldn't gamble on it by jumping to it.

[P_Marlowe]

Pass.

I am not happy, since I would have prefered to show my diamonds
the round before.

With kind regards
Marlowe

[Cascade]

Furlan, on Jul 12 2010, 03:23 PM, said:

First X showed exactly 4 spades.

This is only part of the useful information.

We need to know what the second double means.

Justin has said that it is not penalties and that surely is expert standard. Nevertheless there are some partnerships that play takeout style doubles (takeout, negative, responsive etc) to some lower level.

The bottom line is we need to know what partner means by the double of 4♥ in order to make a sensible bid now.