Corfield Tavern

So tonight i played free APL at the Corfield Tavern in Gosnells... I started with my usual tight aggressive play until the break... after the break i had about 7500 chips (an M of about 25)...

After the break I change to LAG if the table is tight and continue TAG if it is loose... this table was incredibly loose, there wasn't a pre flop raise that wasn't called... So i played extremely tight... I chipped up after a couple of muppets called me down with middle pair... after they saw i wasn't bluffing I managed to steal a few blinds and I went into the final table about 3rd in chips...

I have found that at these final tables players seem to think "Oh wow, I'm at the final table, I might be able to win this!!" and they start playing incredibly tight... I was the only one to raise for about four rounds in a row and i moved into the chip lead... I then picked up KK and put 3 players all in... then the miraculous happened and my hand held up!.. so I found myself with a 3 to 1 chip lead over the person in 2nd...

Then the bad luck kicked in... my strategy was to raise my marginal and decent hands and continue to take down the blinds without effort and fold my terrible hands... I picked up hands like K10os and A9os and I had to raise with them (limping would allow too many hands to see the flop and negate my post flop continuation bets)... I continually ran into dominating hands ( KJ or A10 for example) and lost the majority of my chips...

It came down to three handed and i was in 2nd position (1st had about 80 000, 2nd had about 50 000 and 3rd had about 30 000, the blinds where 5 000 and 10 000)... I picked up KJos in the small blind and put the BB (the small stack) all in, he called with J9os... my KJ held up to put me heads up with the big stack... at this point we both had 80 000 (this figure isn't exact, I think he had about 2000 more than me but for this example it doesn't matter)...

Before the first hand of heads up started the blinds went up to 10 000 and 20 000... this is were my problem with APL is... this blind structure leaves NO movement for playing heads up (we both have M's of 2.6)... this means that we are pretty much forced into an all-in situation on every hand... to my advantage, my opponent did not realize this and folded the first 3 hands to my all-in bets... this gave me an advantage of 110 000 to 50 000... you can see how this blind structure is stupid... on the fourth hand my opponent picked up AKos and called my all in bet... I had A7os... his AK held up and the chips changed to 100 000 vs 80 000... the next hand i went all in again and he folded giving me 100 000 to his 80 000... at this point I still don't believe my opponent understands the blind levels are so high ( if he folds 4 more hands preflop he'll be all-in blind) the next hand I pick up A4os... he went all-in and I called again, he shows AJos his hand holds up leaving me with 20 000 and him 160 000... the next hand I'm committed to the pot (with %50 of my chips in the blind) and i look down at 67c, I raise all in and he calls with Q7os... dominated, I lose to a Q on the flop and dam my luck and the huge blinds...

I believe that if the blinds were smaller I would have been able to dominate my opponents tight play with an "always raise on the button" strategy because my opponent was consistently folding their big blind... 2nd is the first loser in my book and i always expect 1st when I'm heads up, but with the blinds so high luck becomes a huge factor and I am never lucky so I'll have to live with 2nd... not happy but content...

I also want to comment on a player who I had sitting next to me who had dropped out ages ago... this player insisted on looking at my cards when I was playing 3 handed and heads up... this player is not a quality player but is a regular at the APL venues... I was too kind to tell her that I didn't want her looking at my cards (when I play her I can read her so well that I can guess her exact two cards almost every time)... I know that the players I'm playing are good enough to read her so I feel as if she is giving away my hand every time she looks at them... it doesn't bother me enough to tell her not too (because its only free league) but it still gets on my nerves...

A funny example of this particular player is earlier in this tournament... I picked up A9os in the BB... The player in question called as did three other players including the SB... the flop came K89 rainbow... The player in question was sitting directly to my left... I checked and she went all in, declaring loudly "I'm all in" and slamming her chips into the middle (about 5x the pot)... I immediately realized she probably had the nuts or close to it and prepared to fold... two people called her bet and when it came to my turn she started tapping my leg vigorously... I have found that many armature players think its nice manners to let the person next to them know when they have the best hand... I laughed and almost said to her that she doesn't have to tap my leg to let me know she has the best hand, I refrained and just folded... she turned over 88 to take down the pot...

I find it funny that she can so obviously show she has the best hand by the way she bets and still get two callers (one with a gut shot straight draw, and one with top pair low kicker)... I don't know whether I am missing something in the fundamentals of poker or they really are just that bad... there are so many players who play like this that it amazes me, but i guess it is only free poker in the end...

Signing off

Shane