After two early cashes in the WCOOP on behalf of Withnail's Poker School, my confidence was riding reasonably high and I could smell a big success just round the corner. Well, my olfactory system obviously isn't what it used to be as I spent the next few tournaments being spit roasted by a double-act of bad luck and bad play. Subsequent weeks of alcohol abuse and psychotherapy have happily blurred my memory of what exactly happened, but I'll see what sort of selected highlights I can dredge up from the depths of my diseased mind. 

$500 NL Hold'em Heads-up matches

The peculiar aspect of this tournament was the fact that it didn't get nearly enough runners to meet Pokerstars $1 million guarantee, so that several hundred people had to sit around twiddling their thumbs (or whatever else they felt like twiddling) for the first 2 1/2 hours as they had a bye to the next round. Handily, Withnail, the Coach and I were all beneficiaries of this bye-frenzy, but a fat lot of good it did Withnail as he came across a card-rack calling-machine in Round 2 and presumably sloped off into the streets of North London to slaughter a prostitute. Mind you, it didn't do yours truly much good either as I ran into a brick wall in round 3. Thank God the Coach can play!

The most interesting hand of the night was my victory in round 2, against some egg called Thay3r who the Coach informs me is some sort of Pokerstars legend. I'm not quite sure why. As far as I can tell he's simply the world's biggest non-believer. In our final hand we found ourselves equal-chipped with about 15k each. He raised, comme toujours, and I called with my pretty-looking A9. The flop came 236, which was enough to set my heart racing. I practically had the nuts. Knowing that he would inevitably bet, I went for the cunning check-raise bluff, which I'd already got away with a few times and was proving fairly profitable. To my dismay he proved stubborn and called. The J on the turn didn't seem to make much difference so, in the grand tradition of blindly betting into an unknown hand out of sheer bloody-mindedness, I fired in another few thousand. He insta-called. Cobblers. Now the 2 paired on the river, leaving me up the proverbial waterway without a propulsive instrument. By this time we'd both lumped in about 5500 so, with 9500 left and a juicy 11k in the pot, I figured I had no choice but to blithely shove the rest in. And he called. Almost instantly. With A4. 

Nice call. Well played. Unlucky.

After this demonstration from Thay3r of how to play a hand as badly as you can, my hopes were high for the next round, but sadly it was not to be. Once again I came across a relentless calling-machine, but, as he lacked the innate aggression of Thay3r, it seemed only a matter of time until I ground him down for an easy victory. But then, obviously, I was dealt the 96 of clubs. You can guess the rest!

Having raised and called a reraise (as you do), I took in a flop of K72 with two clubs. He bet his standard follow-through amount. I knew he probably didn't have a great deal as on a few previous occasions he’d reraised, bet the flop, but then switched off and given up on the turn, allowing me to take it. I could’ve raised here with my ropey flush draw and no pair but I couldn't really handle a reraise and I figured I'd probably get paid if I hit on the turn anyway. So I called, waiting for my dreamy little club to pop up. It didn't. The 7 paired instead. As expected, he switched off and I sensed a chance to nick it. So I bet 4k, nearly the size of the pot. Annoyingly, he called. Buggerfuck. Now a queen popped up on the river. It was not a club. FML, as the experts say. Once again he checked to me, and once again I obeyed the demonic little voice in my head saying: "Must... win... pot...". I moved all-in, for an enormous amount. He called very quickly. With AQ. Aargh.

The queen was a particularly sick card on the river. If an ace comes I almost certainly take fright and check it down behind him (or he bets himself). If a 6 or 9 comes I probably check it down, and win. If a club comes I also win. If the ace or queen of clubs comes I wipe him out. And last, but not least, if anything other than an ace or queen comes then I still go all-in, he passes, and I win a big one. There's no way in hell this clown was calling with an unimproved AQ. So, all in all, that queen was a really bad card. FML.

I'll try to recall over the next few days what the hell happened to me in the other tournaments, but I wouldn't hold your breath. I was probably drunk anyway. Unfortunately I do remember all-too-clearly what befell the Three Musketeers in the $5000 Main Event. Let's just say it wasn't pretty. Stay tuned for the next exciting chapter!

Miros