Friday, February 16, 2007

Poker: Reading Casino "Beginners night"

Myself, Jon, Andy, Bill and Sean all went to the "beginner's night" at Reading Casino last night. Got there 7:30pm just in time for registration. The game was £10 rebuy No Limit Holdem.... the fact you only had to pay £10 a go makes it suitable for beginners apparently :-)

We then hit the tables (well, me and Bill did anyway) My £20 investment in the "drizzle money away" machine that is Roulette was actually very good to me, so managed to walk away with £120 paying for my evening out already !

It was soon time to get down to the serious business of playing in the poker tournament. We started at 8:40pm with the maximum capacity 80 players, so might be a late night !!

My table was fairly tight, but with couple of the guys not afraid to make stabs at the pot. I played 1 or 2 hands in the first 20 as I had absolute rubbish. Eventually I had 9-8 os on BB and saw 8,T,J flop. Decided to bet out and as it was the first time I showed any strength, only 1 player stayed with me, who had A-K. My straight never came, but the 8s were enough to take a pot !

After that I won a couple of pots, then found myself with about 3000 chips and A-8 suited. Four players saw the flop which was A-K-7 I called the minimum bet and 3 players saw the turn which was a 2. Called another minimum bet and was heads up with another 2 falling on the river. The guy bet half the pot, which happened to be all my chips and I was hoping he had A-Q or similar so would be a split pot...... so called..... unfortunately the 2 on the river, which persuaded me to call, gave his pocket 7s a full house so had to buy more chips !

Little later in the game I had Q-9 and flopped top pair. Called a bet and the turn was another Q. I was a little concerned about being out kickered, but called the all-in bet anyway as it left me with chips over, but the other guy had J-9 and had flopped a straight.... only the J on the river would help me and sure enough the poker gods teased my opponents good luck by giving me a J on the river and a split pot.... phew !

By the break and end of rebuys, I was on 3000 chips, compared to the average of around 3500 so not too bad. Jon, Andy and Bill were all around the same Sean just said he had lost count of his rebuys...

After the restart the blinds were now 200-100 so was starting to feel under pressure. Played steadily but wasn't really getting any hands. Limped in couple of times but completely missed flop each time. Blinds were either rubbish hands which missed, or got raised but never really felt like I had a good hand.

I had drizzled my chips away to around 1600 and the blinds were up to 400-200 now. Luckily I was on the button so could relax for a few hands... but no... the management decided to break up out table and I got moved straight into a BB - my luck was definitely not in, especially as my crap hand got raised to put me all-in pre-flop so didn't even get a flop for my money. Similar story on the SB, so sat there fiddling with my single 1000 chip waiting for a hand. Went all-in under the gun, and everyone folded so had the blinds at least..... then went all in a couple of hands later and got called by the lowest chip stack. Although I won the hand, felt a bit cheated that my decent cards didn't even double me up ! Got involved in another hand but had to back out, which put me back down to dangerously low level again.... then to add insult to injury the table got broken up again !

With my chip stack 2 x BB and on a table of 9 players again, I decided to not bother looking at my cards and stick in my chips when I was UTG again. Just got called by the button and the blinds both folded My Q-9 was up against AA ! My luck came back to me as 9 came on the flop to give me some hope, but had to wait for the river to see a Q and a double up.... if I had looked at my cards I may have felt a little embarrassed (perhaps :-) )

In the end, I got no good enough hands to push, so ended up slipping back to all-in blind. This time, although my A5 looked good, my opponents AT hit his T and took my chips, putting me out in 31st place

Only Jon was left playing, so went and played my new friend Roulette again. Managed to build up another £100 profit before blowing it on couple of big 44% chance bets neither of which came in for me.... but still managed to leave (2:30am!!) with a smile and my gambling fund increased

The £200 freezeout tournament looks very tempting now

Finishing positions
Sean : Out first
Bill : Next out
Andy : around about 35th
Mike : 31st
Jon : 12th

(Top 9 positions payed out.... £980 for 1st, £500 2nd, £300 3rd, down to £50 9th)

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