Royal Flush Poker

Event 46 $5,000 No Limit Holdem 6 handed event This event saw 805 players battle it out for the bracelet and $911,855 for first place.

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It was eventually left to Joe Commisso and Richard Lyndaker by the end, and their heads up came to an end when Lyndaker made a play with (9,7) preflop. Unfortunately he walked into (A,Q) and after the queen hit on the flop, there never seemed to be any way back for Lyndaker who still finishes a very respectable second place at cdpoker.co.uk. Joe Commisso wins this event along with the bracelet and a cool $911,855.

Event 47 at www.cdpoker.co.uk $1,500 Seven Card Stud hi/lo Ryan Hughes was the man who finally bested second place finisher Ron Long to win this event, after 544 players and 3 days of play were finished. Hughes takes home $183,368 in prize money for his first place finish, along with his first ever WSOP bracelet.

Event 48 $2,000 No Limit Holdem Alexandre Gomes and Marco Johnson were the final two left after the rest of this events large field of 2317 had fallen. Marco Johnson was unlucky you might say, having got Gomes all in and dominated with (A,A) against (A,10). Somehow however, Gomes managed to catch a set of tens on the turn and stay alive. Gomes went to finish the job a few hands later with (A,K) against Johnsons (Q,J), and picks up the gold bracelet and $770,540 for his first place.

Event 49 the $1,500 No Limit Holdem Event. This event started with a large field of 2718, but by the time the field had been cut down to the final two, it was Rasmus Nielsen and T.C Tran who were left. After a lengthy heads up duel between the two it was Tran who overpowered Nielsen to take home the bracelet and $631,170 in prize money after his (Q,K) held up against Nielsens (Q,J).

Event 50 $10,000 Pot Limit Omaha World Championship. This event saw 381 players enter, and some well known names amongst them too. Despite this it was a rather lesser known man who won the event. Full Tilt sponsored poker pro Peter Jetten could not get away from his final hand when he made the nut straight on the flop, Marty Smyth had made the same hand and all the chips went in the middle. Unfortunately for Jetten Smyth had four cards to a flush too, and promptly rivered a club to take the bracelet and $859,532 for first place.

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Getting started at www.doylesroom.com is quite easy, if you are a player who is new to poker in any form, then you still should be able to get started here without too much trouble.

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After downloading the software at doylesroom.com you are invited to an invitational ‘bounty hunt’ tournament where you get a chance to play against two poker pro legends of the game in either Doyle Brunson or Mike Caro.

If you wish to try things out with ‘play money’ before depositing any real money then Doylesroomcom caters for that too with numerous tournaments and tables which are just for fun. The lobby itself can be a little confusing at first glance but it shouldn’t take too long to get accustomed to.

There are many tournaments on at www.doylesroom.com which are suitable for all types of player, new and old. Many of these are Re-buy tournaments which aren’t to my particular tastes but there are enough tournaments for most people to find what they are looking for.

Live help and support are available and of an excellent standard at Doylesroom.com, so if there are any problems getting started that the troubleshooting sections can’t help with, you needn’t worry. If you are a first time depositor and worry about the safety aspect of online transactions, then Doylesroomcom should ease any fears you have in that department.

They have a great record of being completely secure on such matters and are run by the best known, professional names in poker. So if you like the sound of Doylesroom.com, you needn’t be concerned about getting started, this site ensures that it is a straightforward and simple process all round.

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It can be very difficult to deal with players who are constantly raising every pot at poker.ladbrokes.com.

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They can’t have a made hand every time they are raising of course, so it is important to choose the right time to re-raise and hopefully win the pot from them.

You can of course end up thinking that such a player is always bluffing, but they are usually aware of the loose image they are creating and so can be prone to raising in the same way when they really do have a hand because they think someone will call having got fed up of their constant raising.

There are different types of serial raiser at www.poker.ladbrokes.com I feel, there are those that bet into flops looking to test the waters and pick up pots, and there are those who are raising heavily preflop and bluffing on the flop to a large degree.

Personally I would rather play against those that let you see the flop, this gives you an opportunity to hit the flop well, then set a trap.

In this instance and many others, there isn’t exactly a time to call a poker serial raiser, it’s more a case of when to re-raise a serial raiser. If you think your hand is stronger at a given point in a hand, then you want to fire back and force the issue there and then.

If you are right and you put them all in at poker.ladbrokes.com, and they then decide to call with the worst of it, then you have to sit back and hope your hand holds up. In general though if you flat call a serial raiser they will lead out and bet on the next opportunity because of the hand due to the weakness shown by you not re-raising. Note the opportunity for slow playing a strong hand here.

If someone is raising heavily preflop at www.poker.ladbrokes.com, then all you can do is wait for what are probably the best hole cards, then go with them. The main thing to remember is that serial aggressors can be trapped, and that they don’t have a big hand every time, the rest is for your judgement to decide.

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Newer players getting started at www.skypoker.co.uk will first of all find an innovative system in place whereby, tournaments are shown on television, giving the option for a player to watch their performance back and help them iron out any flaws in their game.

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The graphics on the whole at skypoker.co.uk are not what I would call the finest online, but many players feel such matters are trivial compared to the poker itself.

Skypoker offers games at varying stakes in Limit, Pot Limit, and No Limit formats, the only problem with variety I feel, is that the only game offered is Texas Holdem.

This is somthing www.skypoker.co.uk should look to improve soon if they wish to really compete with the best in online poker.

Skypoker.co.uk offers a start up bonus of 500 points which can be used to enter freerolls to boost the bankroll of a player starting out. Other tournaments which new players will find onsite are daily gaurantee tournaments with prize pools up to £25,000.

Another good feature for new players starting out are onsite tutorials to help improve a players game and meters whilst play goes on to let beginners know how strong their hole cards are. Skypoker is a relatively new site and as such their aspects of player traffic need time to improve, new players shouldn’t have any great trouble finding a game to play in though, and this is normal for new sites online.

On the whole I feel www.skypoker.co.uk is easy to find your way around and get started with, it offers a reasonably good poker playing experience too.

There are other sites which I feel offer a better all round package, as the lack of variety in types of available poker needs to be improved, and player traffic increased. These two issues of course walk hand in hand, and increased player traffic should follow a better variety of available games amongst other small improvements.

Sky Poker is overall a good site to get started out on, and should only improve with time.

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Freepokerleague is a site which gives all the latest information on many things about poker, including how to play online and subsequently build bankrolls for free. Amongst the information given, you can find many big name poker sites and the bonus money they offer for first time deposits. Also listings for all ongoing freerolls and good value tournaments can be found for major sites such as Bodog, Full Tilt, Pokerstars, and many more.

On top of this regularly updated information, there are listings for poker based TV programmes, players looking to form a home game, and books dedicated to the game too. The site has a good layout and is generally a provider of very accurate and helpful informtaion for all poker players. Those getting started online will gain the most benefit of course, as each sites offers are there for a prospective online player to compare and choose from.

Also on offer are links to strategy based sites, as well as poker forums and sites with informtaion on land based tournaments. On the whole the site is an extensive archive of all things to do with poker and is very helpful to players interested in the subject. Even players who have never even played the game can find detailed information on how to play the main variations of poker. This, along with all the other information on Freepokerleague should set them on the right road to being a successful poker player on no time. If you haven’t ever checked Freepokerleague out, it is certainly worth spending time looking at whether you are a beginner, or a seasoned professional.

If you happen to be playing poker in a casino, it is probably not even somthing you think about, but there are always going to be occasional dealers who aren’t fantastic at their job and make errors. Thankfully these sort of instances are very rare, such is the professionalism of most dealers, but imagine how tedious their job must be, sitting hour after hour dealing cards to players. It would be easy to have a momentary lapse of concentration you might think, but this hardly ever seems to happen.

As a player I feel this is my way of showing my appreciation for people who do this job, because if they did make a mistake, it could cost someone lots of money.

Imagine the possible ramifications of a mistake when dealing out the hole cards, you could have been dealt (A,K) or Aces but, due to an error the hand might have to be re dealt. This might mean you didn’t win all the chips of the guy next to you with (A,Q) that you would have if the mistake hadn’t occurred, and then the whole course of the tournament is altered. This is only theoretical of course but it shows the importance of dealers remaining professional and vigilant.

On a more general note, it is important that dealers are quick as well as efficient. This is because a player usually wants to get their blinds in, and the hand underway, before the level goes up when there are only seconds remaining before it does. Also card dealers must be completely aware of the rules and have a good grasp of figures to be able to count out chips and mediate during hands.

So next time you sit down to play poker and you have the luxury of a professional dealer at your table, be thankful, and be aware of the fantastic job they do in the world of poker.

Going on to win a SNG or ‘Sit and Go’ tournament, is not an easy thing to do for many players. They can do all the hard work in making to the final two or three players, but have trouble converting this to a first place finish.

I am sure that different players will have different theories on this but personally, I think that you need to be very aggressive from the outset. If you start off with a chip lead when you are heads up this is easier, more so for a bigger chip lead.

Almost always come into the pot raising on the first few hands, for me this is imperitive. It immediately puts a ’siege’ mentality into the players mind. They won’t get involved in most pots if they think you are going to force them to put everything in the middle before the hand is done. If you get away with this in the first few hands, most players will retreat into their shells and wait for a strong hand, this means they start giving you many of their small blinds because they think the moment they call they are going to be faced with a big raise.

As the aggressive player you need to be ready for the moment when they make the call or
re raise you, and give them credit for a good hand, because it’s probably the hand they have been waiting for.

But if you have managed to wear them down and pick up their blinds for several hands then it might be worth making the call as an underdog. Because if you think about it, you have already picked up a lot of chips from them just through aggression, and if they are worn down to a short stack, it’s worth the gamble. If you double them up then just resume your aggressive play and wear them down again.

If your opponent starts off fighting fire with fire, and keeps betting back at you, then for me I just find a half decent hand and go for it. If I end up being on the defensive and being pushed into a corner by my opponents aggression then I’m as good as gone. Im better off finding any marginal hand and taking a stand.

Sometimes when important decisions must be made at Blue square poker, players need a little extra time to ensure they come up with the right answers.

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Every player in major live tournaments will have quite a period of time to make their decisions, due to the other players understanding this need for extra thought on important decisions.

There is no preset time allowance for any action as such, although others players can ask for a clock to be put on a player after a few minutes has elapsed. Once this clock has been called the player has 1 minute to act otherwise his hand is folded.

I feel it is right and fair that in a game where decisions can cost thousands, that there is no rigid timeframe in place in tournament play.

And the poker players are almost always very courteous about allowing several minutes before calling a clock.

One difference you will find in online play, on sites such as bluesquarepoker.com, is that no such rules exist and that is a shame I think.

Each player has their own clock, and on some sites, such as www.bluesquarepoker.com these can run down in a matter of 30 seconds – 1 minute depending on the site.

The sites should take notice of this, because it isn’t exactly a very strong incentive to play high stakes poker on their site. It simply isn’t worth the risk if you feel you are going to be bullied into making a bad decision, because you haven’t got sufficient time to contemplate everything fully.

Pokerstars is in my opinion, leading the way in combatting this to some degree with a ‘time bank’ where you can use extra time for important decisions. I still feel the feature could be improved however.

Other sites should look at this problem in more depth, it is of course also important not to inconvenience other players, as there is always a fine line with such matters.

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Event 36, the $1,500 No Limit Holdem event, saw a final table of relatively unknown players, and it was Jesper Hougaard who won the bracelet and $610,304 for first place after defeating Cody Slaubaugh, whose (A,10) never looked like overtaking Hougaards (Q,Q) as a queen fell on the flop in the final hand.

Event 37 was the Omaha hi/lo $10,000 World Championship event and it was Full Tilt Professional David Benyamine who claimed the title and $535,687 for first place after defeating Greg Jamison heads up. 6 Full Tilt pros managed to make the last 10 in this event, with Mike Matusow continuing an excellent World Series thus far by finishing 5th behind Toto Leonidas.

Event 38 was the $2,000 Pot Limit Holdem Event, Davidi Kitai emerged triumphant after his heas up battle with Chris Bell after he had outlasted a field of 605 players. He took home $244,546 for his win.

Event 39 $1,500 No Limit Holdem Poker Event, saw pro player Chris Woo bettering his 5th place of last year in this event to take the bracelet and $631,656 home for first place after defeating second place man Matthew Wood.

Event 40 $2,500 2-7 Triple Draw Event, it was John Phan who was victorious here picking up his second bracelet at this years World Series. He beat a field of 238 players, with Shun Uchida finishing second place. Phan wins his second bracelet in a space of only a few days and takes home $151,896 for his win.

Protecting a bankroll is very important in any sort of poker, it helps you maintain faith in your ability as a player, which can sometimes be an issue if you continuously lose your bankroll and have to start from scratch.

The main reasons and things to avoid I feel, when it comes to losing bankrolls, are not based on any lack of skill on the players part They are more a case of being tempted into bigger ring games and tournament buy ins, due to success at lower levels. The fact is that to justify moving up to higher level games you must be consistently winning lower level tournaments and expanding your bankroll. Even then there is certainly no harm in staying at that level of play because your bankroll is moving in the right direction. Never be in too much of a hurry to move up to bigger games online, because a small mistake or unlucky run will render useless, so much more good work you have put into the smaller level games.

Another key point in terms of protecting a bankroll is to not let bad beats affect your play. If you feel irritated or angry about a couple of things going wrong, it can be tempting to throw good money after bad and play a higher buy in tournament to try and recoup the losses. The best course of action in my opinion is to take a couple of hours away from the computer until you have calmed down and feel you can come to a table with your best game. Anything less than your best game can see your bankroll continue to slide backwards, so be disciplined, have faith in yourself, and don’t move up to the next level games until you really have made a lot of ground with your bankroll.