Use It or Lose It

It would be hard not to double with East's hand, given that partner has made a vulnerable preempt and East has what looks like three tricks in hand.

West led the ♦ K, and declarer, Jeff Miller (OldProf on OKbridge,) won the ace in dummy and led the ♥ 7, ducked all around. The ♥ 9 was then lead, again ducked all around, West pitching a diamond.

Jeff then led a high club off dummy, and East won. East then led a diamond, and ruffed a diamond, leading to:

			♠ Q J 10 8 ♥ — ♦ — ♣ Q J 9
♠ 7 5 2 ♥ — ♦ 9 7 ♣ 8 6						♠ 9 4 3 ♥ K J ♦ — ♣ 10 5
			♠ A K 6 ♥ A Q 8 ♦ — ♣ 7

East exited a spade, and declarer won in hand, played a club to the queen, ruffed the ♣ J, and then ran the spades. East was caught in a coup, forced to ruff in front of declarer's ace-queen. Somehow, with all those beautiful trumps, she managed to only score one of them.

East can score two trump tricks by expending a high trump early. Why? Well, notice that when East got her diamond ruff, she was down to king-jack-ten in trumps, so she was ruffing with one of the high cards, anyway. By covering the ♥ 7, she forces South to use a higher trump, and she can ruff the diamond with one of her low trumps.