The Unusual Suspects Helsinki Adventure

Mon 12/Dec/05 - Sat 17/Dec/05
Grand Casino, Helsinki,
by Jen Mason
Submitted on Fri, 23/12/2005 - 10:22pm

The €2000 No-limit main event at the Grand Casino Helsinki this month was the first Scandinavian tourney for us Unusual Suspects, and my first journey to the latitude of Finland. Together with JP, James ‘Flushy' Dempsey and Jonathan Raab, I braved Luton armed with all the warm clothes I could muster and we headed in a North-Easterly direction. The ride over took just three hours from London, and the conversation on the way was all about whether it would be dark all the time and just how we were meant to play against a field made up almost entirely of Scandies. A collective of very young Swedish, Norwegian and Finnish players have been winning events left right and centre, including the Team Norsemen and the frankly scary Finnish natives Juha Helppi and Patrick Antonius – so just what would it be like to play them on their home turf? Those of us who remained conscious had this discussion; JP was out like a light immediately after takeoff and remained asleep in what looked like a very uncomfortable position for the whole journey.

At Helsinki airport, we met up with Burnley John, and Bluesquare online league runner-up ‘Platy,' real name Nick, and after a brief holdup while my mobile was retrieved from the seat pocket in which I had left it, we decamped to the hotel, which was conveniently located near the airport. And less conveniently located about a half hour from the town centre and the Casino itself. Nevertheless, it was warm and had a hot chocolate machine, which made up for it, at least in my opinion. With a whole night stretching ahead of us, we scouted out the Casino, briefly marvelled at its modern yet sumptuous décor (everyone except JP who'd left his ID in his room), found a sportsbar which served food, and headed back to play some cards. We found a slightly troublesome yet ultimately effective wifi available in the lobby, and so kept ourselves busy online, but not before JP and John had both won an initial heads up match against James and me respectively.

So, relatively fresh, we returned the next day to see what a tournament in Finland was like. For a start, the place was lovely to look at, with comfortable tables and chairs and marvellously adept dealers and calmly professional staff. The players weren't all nutters either. But there were their fair share – there was some interesting early action which I will come to in a minute. But mostly everyone was friendly, and had that irritating attribute of speaking far better English than we do pretty much any foreign language. Makes me want to get a ‘Beginner's Guide to Finnish' out just so I can surprise them next time…

We started with 20,000 chips and initial blinds at 50/100, and with hour levels I was wondering how the field of 150 would provide a winner after just two days. There was plenty of time to have a peek at the other tables at the beginning, and note the expected prevalence of local players and relatively local Europeans, and the lack of big American names, and Americans in general. I spotted WPT Champion Juha Helppi fairly rapidly, however, who ended up finishing in 8 th , no pun intended, and regulars like Joe Grech, and Pascal Perrault. A certain Tony Kendall was there, too.

The early action depended on table; mine was fairly sedate, but directly behind me there were two double-ups in the first half hour, both at the expense of A4, and both giving British players an early lead. Flushy's flat call of a raise with AK from the big blind hit a King-high flop and his opponent bet 5k on the flop, and mysteriously called all-in with A4 on the turn which had brought the 4. James put his initial large stack to good use, only tripping up when Pascal did just that with his 10s, forcing him to lay down two pair and steam for half an hour.

The other coup involved JP Kelly's set of fives taking out fellow Tikay's A4 on an A 4 5 flop. He was apparently already sick of the aggressive youngster's pushing the table around, and accidentally doubled him up while teaching him a lesson, giving him a head start towards his eventual 15 th place finish. A rather rueful Mr. Kendall was sat in the (lovely, leathery) bar shaking his head in the first break, but giving JP the credit for being the aggressor right from the start.

Playing infrequently but aggressively was the only option for most of the early stages – limpers' tax was invariably charged and starting hand requirements seemed to be ‘have been dealt two cards.' There were plenty of strange things to be seen at showdown. Burnley John was out first of the Suspects, with A10 against Martin Wengt's Q10, followed by Nick whose stack had taken an early hit from which he never quite recovered, while I was in fairly bog standard mid-to-low chip position for most of the day. It was the two youngest members who built up the early lead in the tournament as a whole, but James' luck was not to hold throughout the day and he was out 6 levels in, eliminated by the same Mr. Wengt.

There were some big hand accidents elsewhere – Chandra Khajuria's KK gave his 60k stack to Pascal Perrault in the afternoon when the Ace of his AK hit the flop. Pascal was then fairly quickly moved along with his 130,000 chips to my right and remained there for the duration of my tournament. Even when I moved tables, about half an hour later, there he was, back on my right.

The European Rankings were drawing to a close along with the year, and this tournament was one of the very last to provide points which could potentially alter the winner. Pascal was very definitely in the running, along with John Falconer and Mickey Wernick, the eventual Rankings winner. This tournament was the make-or-break one for those still collecting points and it looked for a while like Pascal was on track to make the final, with such an early lead. However, as day One ended, he got involved in a big pot with an early raiser (who held AA). Pascal's 99 hit a set, but his opponent was all-in on the turn with the nut flush draw, hitting the rivered Ace instead to take a big chunk out of his chips. He eventually went out about halfway through Day Two, rumour has it with a couple of pairs of sixes...

It doesn't matter how comfortable the set-up, after Day One's 10 hours of play you're ready for bed. A little exploring of the town had to be done though, and I have to say that having travelled fairly widely around Southern Europe, it's just different up there. There was a quirky idiosyncratic feel to the bars and restaurants we wandered into, and despite the darkness and sub-zero temperature, people were out and about having fun and despite only having had a few hours to sneak a peak, Helsinki has gone on my (ever-expanding) list of Places to Go in the Summer, Nothing to Do with Poker. I even liked the shopping mall into which the casino unexpectedly opened out the back. We had dinner somewhere called the Wrong Noodle Bar.

I snuck into Day Two fairly low stacked, despite having done my very best to arrange a double through checking a flopped set of queens the previous evening. The overnight leader Jonas Molander was out in front by a mile, but the action sped up considerably right from the start as the 50-or-so players who came back realised that with only nine places paid, they'd better aim for that final or go out trying. I made an ill-timed move against two players, an under the gun raiser and a button caller from the blind on a raggy flop, seeing the raiser fold with satisfaction, and the other guy beat me into the pot. Don't do this against someone holding Aces. Here endeth the lesson.

Although it looked like it would never get to the point where the blinds were of any real consequence, the mid-afternoon of Day Two saw pressure building on the shorter stacks as the antes (to which we're not accustomed in the UK) took their extra toll. JP played a great game and was unlucky to run into Juha's big blind AK when he made a button move with Q 10 of hearts. The longest-lasting Suspect was also the only one not old enough to play in Vegas. It was late in the day by the time JP finally rejoined us in the Radisson's lobby, and there looked to be almost no time left to play the remaining heads up matches. He gamely agreed to play then, but lost both his matches while I had already lost to James, who in turn beat John. You following this? Anyway, the two days had taken their toll on us and we were ready to relax for a while, anywhere warm that could furnish Tikay with a continuous supply of tea.

Back in the Comp, and it was the visiting Swedes who were victorious in the end, with Jonas Molander holding on to the top spot followed by Peter Eichardt. Finland's Jukka Perala took third, although there was business done evening the money. The only British finalist was fourth place Stuart Rutter, sandwiched between the top finishers and Swedes Karam Partovi, Anders Pettersson and Ast Wilhelm and Finland residents JP Juhola and Juha Helppi.

Much later, (still) in the foyer of the Radisson (about thirty seconds from the casino) a gaggle of victors came in and stopped by our coffee table where we were busy inventing an Irish variant in which teams of three each play one card and by table talk alone decide whether to bet and whose cards remain in play. Jonas Molander looked understandably pleased to have won the bizarre Santa-gnome trophy thing, and the band of crazy but sociable internet-based players were great fun. Even Simon Trumper couldn't resist giving it a go, although I maintain that the James/Me team got the hang of it the best – there's nothing like announcing ‘Straight!' and just putting down your 2, knowing that the 5 will follow... We stayed there until 5am, failed to see daylight for the third day in a row, and kept Tikay busy playing our ridiculous game until he had to go straight to the airport to catch his flight. I am already plotting a return for the Midnight Sun festival in about six months' time.