Satellite near misses

Well, doing the updates more regularly didn’t last very long.

Played Thursday 27th in Manchester Circus in a £30 rebuy with the winner getting a seat in the GSNPC.

Started well and built up a healthy stack without the need for any rebuys.

This kept me going along with a healthy stack until we got near the bubble.

By then I was down to 23000 chips with the blinds at 2000 4000 and I went all in with 9T in the cut off which was called by the big blind with A7.

A 9 on the flop was enough to give me a timely double up.

Got to the final table with about 40000 chips and after a couple of rounds, we're down to 8 players with the blinds at 3000 6000 and I'm in the big blind with 24o.

It is folded to the small blind who looks like he is going to pass but then decides to call.

As he's considering changing his mind about folding I'm thinking, lovely, you'd be silly to call now cos I'm going to raise you.

Anyway, he does call and I raise to 18000.

He calls and the flop comes 335, he checks so I go all in for my last 22000 chips and he called with A8 so were 50:50 - any A, 2, 4, 6 and I still win but nothing and I'm out for £200.

Not too concerned about this, all the money was in the top places with the prize money doubling from 2nd to 1st place which I think is way too big a gap but I suppose they often get chopped near the last few anyway.

Then I played a satellite to the GSNPC for £50.

This was one hell of a crapshoot but everything seemed to go my way and I got good hands at the right time until I was heads up against a young lad (Martyn Robinson) who I now know quite well (we ended up taking 10% of each other in the tournament and he ended up going out one before the bubble - who got a signed chipset).

Anyway, heads up I had a 3-1 chip lead and decided (wrongly) that I had an edge over him and so started to play a lot of pots with him, whenever I had a good hand he had nothing and whenever I bluffed at him he had the nuts.

Granted I didn't play well heads up and he took the seat.

I then played day 1a in the GSNPC and made what I understand now to be a bad read in the pivotal hand of my tournament.

Level 2 (blinds at 50 100) and I limped UTG with KK - something I very rarely do but decided to give it a whirl after I had talked to Jasmes Ackenhead about it when I was on the cruise.

Anyway, that is when the action started as there was a raise in seat 5 to 300 which was called in seat 6 and then reraised by the small blind to 600. I decided to 4 bet 1600 which was called by the small blind.

The flop came 7c6c4d and the small blind checked and I bet a hopefully weak looking 2000 which he flat called.

The turn was 8c and he went all in for his last 6000 odd - marginally covering me.

I stared him down as I do and asked him a couple of questions, telling him that I thought he had queens on the flop but he didn't really give me a great deal of reaction to this.

I ran through the possibilities and didn't think the set was very likely but maybe a possibility, maybe a pair of 5s if he was hoping to hit a set on the flop but flopped an open ended draw but thought that would be a check raise on the flop, maybe a flush draw but again ditto and then maybe queens or Aces.

After all this, and his lack of any nervousness when I virtually tild him I had kings, I felt he had to have aces and folded.

I've posted this hand on AWOP and Blonde and the majority of people have this down as an instant call saying he has 99-QQ although I still think he would have played aces the same way.

Anyway, it turned out that later he told Martyn who was also on our table that he had queens so again I probably made a bad fold, something I'm going to have to stop doing.

Maybe I'm looking for too many monsters under the bed when I get involved and I need to just accept that if he has aces in that spot then I'm losing my chips

Anyway, lesson learned I hope and I ended up going to the G in Manchester to play the £30 single rebuy and again I didn't need the rebuy as I had 22000 chips at the break (starting at 5000).

However, once again, the rising blinds as the tournament became a bit of a crapshoot meant I was out in about 20th.

I also bubbled in Friday's GUKPT satellite after having a pot checked down when I was all in by a "friend" who was a big chip leader with 55000 on the bubble.

I actually won that hand to get back up to average stack but then after a min raise from 3000 to 6000 by the UTG I reraised all in for 33000 on the big blinds with AhKh which was called by UTG with 77.

Not the greatest play by him but he won the seat and I got $0.

Thanks to Teambooth who I immediately deleted from all my contacts and buddy lists.

I know Mark from Leo's and I was not impressed at all.

Anyway, rant over…

Update, just played my first WSOP satellite on Pokerstars ($33 rebuy - 1 seat) and I ended up finishing 4th when my 110000 button all in with Q8 when the blinds were 10000 20000 was called by the big stack (400000 chips) with - wait for it ... 7c4c! - I had a really tight image too. 74! Oh well I'm going to have to play that tournament again, hardly had to do a thing to get people to donate chips to me - even accounting for the runner runner straight taking my first 4000 chips after I had doubled up early!