EPT San Remo by Ivo Donev
Written by: adminHello my fellow RedKings readers,
I am going to tell you more in detail about a very interesting hand that happened during the EPT San Remo:
It took place at Level 5, Blinds 150/300. An unknown loose Italian player limped in UTG (in first position) and all folded to me on the Small Blind where I was looking down on J9 off suit. Not bad enough to fold and not good enough to raise out of position. The pot odds have also been pretty good with 5:1 and I decided to play it tight and just flat call. The BigBlind wanted to see the flop without any more action and quickly checked.
The flop came down J 3 4 blank and I had top pair with a pretty weak kicker. In those kinds of situations I usually decide to mix up my game between 3 different plays:
a. placing a small bet
b. check with the intention to flat call behind if someone is going to bet
c. check with the intention to check/raise if someone is going to bet
In this case, I noticed that the Limper was a pretty loose cannon (he did not only play more than 50% of his hands, but also played em pretty deep after the flop) and made a bet of 500 to find out where I stand.
The Big Blind immediately lost the interest into playing this hand any further and folded, but the italian Limper was a bit sore that I had the nerves to make a bet and don’t check as expected … and decided to make a decent reraise to 1500! Normally you would have to fold if it was against a tight player, because …
1. I got a tough hand out of position against a limper in early position
2. he would represent an overpair with this reraise like AA, KK or QQ or likely a top pair with a better kicker (AJ, KJ, QJ)
3. when I call the reraise to 1500, there will likely follow a strong bet on the turn
But I did not believe the Italian because of his pretty loose image and therefore … just flat called!
The turn was of course my magic card on that blank board when the Jack of hearts showed up. Now I was pretty sure that I had the best hand. Now this time was expected, I checked to him and gave my opponent the chance, to hang himself. The loose fish bite and fired out another bet of 1500 Chips. Now I had 2 options:
c) Raise – many players would have raised in my situation with the hope of the better hand and the possibility that the loose player would invest more into this spot without any hope and put all his chips in the middle
d) Flat call with the intention to signalize weakness on the river and make him bet once again
I thought for a while and decided for myself, that the second option would be more profitable in that case. I just flat called and symbolically backed out to my bunker. The river was a blank 2 and checked again as planned before. On the hand, I saved a bit of money if I was already down and lost (for example against a Jack with a better kicker), on the other hand I would let him bluff until the end into that pot and extract more value out of him. Additionally, if it was really a bluff: A loose player would unlikely realize to check behind on the river and give up this pot!
With those ideas on my mind, I checked graciously on the river. My opponent was unstoppable and fired out another bet, this time 3000. Once again I told to myself that there is no reason to raise on the river because it would have been very obvious that I represented the set of Jacks and also, he would just call if there was a chance that he could beat the set there. And if he was bluffing, he would not have paid anyways and it’s better to pick another read and see his cards in the showdown rather than missing this information in that spot.
Therefore I just called his bet and he announced Ace high and pulled down his panties with A 7 off suit – what a monkey! I quietly showed my J9 and the opponent almost fell off his chair and was obviously more than unhappy that I played my set of Jacks so passively!
I was just asking myself: How many blatant mistakes did that Italian guy make in that situation here?!
1. Limping in UTG on a full table with A7 off suit – huge mistake!
2. Raise on the flop with Ace high – small mistake, but an option to get more information where he stands in this hand
3. Bet on the turn even though the opponent called the raise on the flop out of position – huge mistake!
4. Bet on the river after the opponent called down the bets on flop and turn out of position – once again huge mistake!
That’s how this Italian managed to give away „generously“ more than half of his stack in just one single hand on fairly small Blinds!
Despite this pretty good start, I finished the tournament on day 2 on place 310 out of 1180 participants.
Always wishing you a good hand: Ivo – The Chess Master
www.ivodonev.com