Advanced Holdem

The Luck of the Draw

You’re sitting there at the poker table with a strong pairing in your starting hand.  The dealer has been dealing you a pile of …. for most of the evening… and now at last you have a pair of queens… not the strongest but not too bad either… but lets see what I can do with the royal ladies, will they bring me some luck and turn around my fortunes this evening?

A little smile comes over your face and you quickly gain control to make sure no-one saw you.  Hoping it was a just a slight upturn in your lips and not a big toothy grin… a nonchalant glance around at everyone else whilst they are busy looking at their cards…

What do they have?  Are they giving anything away?  Was that a frown or was it a grimace?  Did anyone see me smile?  Well if they did, then they are not letting on and even if they did see it wouldn’t do any harm, I’ll use it to my advantage.

You coolly push a few chips in, not wanting to scare off your opponents, lets do this coolly and make sure we draw them into this one… come on fellas push those chips in, don’t be shy now… you’ve collected my chips to feed your family all evening… now its my time to win some back… its payback time!

But the game really gets going when the flop comes down.  Let’s see what we’ve got… and down it comes 3h, 5h & 6c…….. ahhhh…. groan…. Can it get any worse? Now a potential straight has opened up and I am still only sitting with a pair.

But we have to carry on because all it takes is a royal visit from the main lady, on the turn or the river and we’re in with a chance… so we push in some more chips… and hope for the best… Now my brow is wrinkled and the smile has turned to frown!

What does my friendly dealer lay down on the turn and river?  And, it’s a…. jack of diamonds and a 5c.  Now we have a pair of fives on the board and it only takes one five out there to beat my hand.

My opponents have only got stronger as the community cards have been dealt and one is particularly aggressive.  What do I do?  Do I stay in and keep going further or do I pull out?

In the end I folded, there was just too much chance of my hand being beaten.  And can you guess what hand won the pot?

A pair of jacks… I was so mad!!!!  They had nothing!

But that’s poker for you, you can’t get angry, I did what I thought was best and got beaten.