blonde poker forum

And this will be your info-only thread, just the nuggets of semi-fact hiding beneath the stories, rumours, spin and interactivity of the full fat update....

Play looks to be commencing within 10 minutes.

And here's your lot, all alphabetical like:

Om Aggarwal
Wasim Akhtar
Glenn Ashworth
Z. Aslam
Olabode Ayegun
Miya Badat
Martin Bailey
Alan Barnacle
Paul Campbell
Simon Cawley
Gary Chatterton
Sammy Cheung
Dave Colclough
John Conroy
Gary David
Alan Davies
K. Dionysiou
Andy Douglas
Mark Dyson
Lee Edwards
John Exley
Michael Fletcher
Paul Foltyn
Marc Goodwin
Neil Greenhalgh
Paul Hatton
Richard Herbert
John Hewston
Nichiei Hicks
Leonard Hodgkinson
John Huckley
Arshad Hussain
Chris Huyton
Paul Jackson
David Gent (spelt as Jent on my list, but I reckon this is correct)
Andrew Johnson
Iwan Jones
Hanif Kazi
Tikay
Paul King
Tuan Le
Martino Libertini
Bernard Litman
Nadim Lodhi
Derek Malone
Harry Markham
Michael Mccool
Tom RED-DOG McCready
Alan Mclean
S. Mcneill
Brian Medley
Reyaaz Mulla
Barry Neville
Andreas Olympios
Iqbal Patel
Stephen Pearce
Niamh Peters
Phil Peters
Colin Porter
Mark Rayner
Steve Read
Jim Reid
Robert Rice
Lee Rich
Ian Roberts
Mark Robinson
Stuart Rutter
P. Schuhl
Edward Smith
Peter Smyth
Douglas Stainton
Julian Thew
Matt Tyler
Yunus Umarji
Steve Walmsley
Mickey Wernick
Richard Wong
Jehan Zaib

And it appears as though the fearless Alan McLean is OUT.

All the chips flew in on a flop of 9-3-5

McLean held A-K, and so did his opponent, Umarij Yunas. Unfortunately, the latter had two spades to go with the two spades on the flop.

Another on the Turn and that's all she wrote for McLean.

Fast and Furious at the start here in Grey Rainy Bolton - sheltered from the elements the players are certainly not shy about getting involved early on with their 10k stacks and 25/50 blinds...

H. Kazi is knocked to the felt holding 4c 6h on a 7d 5c 8c 8s 7c board.  His opponent Bernard Litman held the rather more powerful 6d 9d, and there'll be some coming back from 700 chips.

But he's not doing as badly as Peter Smyth, who's OUT, after he called with a set of sevens on a turn which brought three hearts on the board, and also the nut flush for his opponent Neil Greenhalgh.

Paul King, who tells me that unfortunately he's had, to put it mildlly, some car trouble recently, is off the mark with over 20k already(!) which puts him near the top of the early leaders, which is all as well because he's "got to win it to replace the car."

He's "slowplayed pocket Tens" spiking a set on the flop, and turning a house, while his opponent seemed intent on re-raising his check-raise with AQ... Then another set, this time the apt Kings, and he's raced ahead.

Barry Neville is OUT

Pocket Queens vs Pocket Deueces

all-in on a 2-x-x flop

Andreas Olympios, who had halved his stack, is now back up to the 10k after being doubled up by renowned chatterbox, Stephen Pearce.

Flop = 4h 3c 3s

Pearce = 6d 3d

Olympios = Aspades 3s

Turn = Jh, River = 9d

http://blondepoker.com/forum/index.php?topic=14172.msg294504#msg294504

A sneaky link to the early pics.... and here's the lineup for table One, pretty fun to watch, but wouldn't want to have drawn it:

Marc Goodwin
Mickey Wernick
Richard Herbert
Wasim Akhtar
Derek Malone
Andrew Johnson
Julian Thew
Simon Cawley
Lee Rich
John Exley

Tuan Le eliminates an opponent with 6-6 vs K-K

All the chips moved in on a 6-5-T flop.

Pab -- 11,050
RED-DOG -- 6,759
John Hewston -- 10,875
tikay -- 10,850
Stu Rutter -- 8,100
Paul Jackson -- 5,450
Dave Colclough -- 6,125
Iwan Jones -- 8,600

Tom 'RED-DOG' McCready is OUT

Q-Q v Ash Hussain's A-A

T-A-2 flop was a teaser.

No miracle arrived...

Red-Dog is OUT -

Having drawn a pretty hectic table, he found himself taking on the perpetual raiser preflop with Qc Qd - a raise from him, re-raise, and decision to put the rest of the 5k in too - unfortunately, "I ran into Aspades Ac."  Hard luck the Dog - see you on blonde later, if you're not getting the cake online!

Mickey Wernick -- 16,950
Julian Thew -- 3,025
Paul King -- 17,100
Steve Read -- 12,500
Greek Jack -- 8,150

As the blinds raise to 100/200, a corker from the last level which doubled up Mickey Wernick at the expense of Julian:

A flop came Diamond Diamond Diamond.  Little happened there, but on the 9(not diamond) turn, Mickey made it 400, Julian made it 1,400, Mickey made it 5,400, and Julian moved in with his top two.  Mickey was happy with that, as he'd flopped the nut flush and got fully paid... Julian's still in it though.

Time for some table counting, and a couple of stories which just so happened to be happening as I approached:

Table Hewston Calls Mccool with Ace High on Double Paired Board and Wins

Michael McCool      23,400
Ash Hussain          14,400
Nadim Lodhi          8,075
John Huckley        11,150
Paul Rayner          10,800
Colin Porter          18,000
Paul Foltyn            3,000  ("What happened?" I ask.  "I missed," he replied.)
Mark Robinson       8,400
John Hewston       16,000

Table Marc 'Golden' Goodwin

Paul Campbell        10,800
Martin Bailey          18,550
Zafar Aslam            9,000  (Definitely IN)
David Gent             8,200
Tikay                    10,100
Marc Goodwin       35,000  (not a misprint)
Martino Libertini      15,000
Sammy Cheung       6,800
Edward Smith         8,800
Chris Huyton           OUT - in rather dramatic circumstances - holding the Ac Ad, he moved in when Marc checked the 3 5 6 board.  Marc "thought for about a second," then called with his 67.... 9 on the turn, 7 on the river.  Another one bites the dust...

And for the Nick Hicks Fanclub:

He eliminates Lee Edwards thusly - Lee checks and calls the 3c Ts 5c flop, leaving himself just under 4,000, it looked like.
Turn:  8c.  He checks again, Nick moves in enough to put him all in, and it must have looked like a fairly good idea to call with his Kc Th.
Mr. Hicks held 3d 3s though, and with the draw missing on the Js, it's a stack of 17,000 for Nick, and the rail for Lee.

Table Towers of Womble:

Greek Jack    13,800
Andy Douglas  9,775
Mark Dyson     9,300
Paul King         19,000
Richard Wong   10,300
Niamh Peters    13,000
Womble          16,500
Paul Hatton     14,600

snoops again

Thewy's just exited stage left

was down to 3k before moving it in with A-K.

He hit an Ace but his opponent's Pocket Fives flushed on the river.

Bah, humbug!

snoops here

having some real lappie problems, must be a few gremlins in the system

if there were windows here I'd throw the laptop out of one of them

Meanwhile, Pab has doubled up to 5.5k after going short.

Bit of a brave call from his neighbour, who called with Aspades 5s, announcing "Let's gamble!"

Pab's Pocket Tens held up.

strummer     23,000
John Conroy  12,400

Working on the others (a table has broken) but while you're waiting:

Paul Jackson  8,500
Dave Colclough  14,500
Matt Tyler       9,500
Iwan Jones      6,700

Hold that blind raising for a second - 10 minute break while the 25s are retired for the night.  Will then be 150/300

beagle here with some chippy counts for you:

buddy -- 8,100
Pab -- 6,275
Steve Read -- 23,800
vodkaredbull -- 13,950
tikay -- 7,700
geeforce -- 10,400
el blondie -- 11,900

Huge hand took place that doubled Iwan Jones up.

Three hands locked horns preflop - A-Q, K-K, J-J

Jim Reid threw in a couple of thousand on the raggy flop with the Kings and Mateyboy called with A-Q

No Ace arrived, but Jim was left with just 5,050 when the Jack arrived on the River to give the Welshman a set thereby keeping him in the tourney.

hamsterboy -- 25,200
Mickey Wernick -- 2,100
Greek Jack -- 12,650
David Gent -- 15,050
Paul Jackson -- 2,725
Ash Hussain -- 11,075
Steve Read -- 22,875
Paul King -- 18,325
John Hewston -- 13,875
Iwan Jones -- 19,625
Jim Reid -- 4,500
Womble -- 12,750
Matt Tyler -- 8,700
R Mulla -- 14,175
Brian Medley -- 10,725

Zafar Aslam is OUT

He minimum raised with Aces preflop, allowing Marc Goodwin to see a cheapish flop with K-J of diamonds.

Flop = 9s 7d Th

Zafar bet 5k on the flop and Marc reraised, only about 1k more for Aslam though.

Turn = Qd

River = 5h

Mickey Wernick is OUT

He moved his shortstack all-in with Pocket Eights but was outdrawn by 9-7 on a 7-A-7-x-9 board.

Alan Barnacle has also bitten the dust.

Richard Herbert saw a threeway flop of the dangerous-looking Ahrt 5h 7h.  It was slow, at this point. 
The turn, still threeway - 5d.  Check-check...
The river: Qh   Now, with big blind Colin Porter getting out of the way, it goes nuts - bet from Richard (1,600), raise from the button to 5,500, all-in, call!
I am sure someone was expecting the Kh to have donated some chips, but it was actually the unfortunate turned (and slowplayed) house of 7d 7s which lost that big pot to Richard's Qd Qs!

Paul Campbell makes a raise to 1,200 in late position, which Marc Goodwin calls from the small blind, saying, "I'm only calling because I've got position..."  The Ace-high two-spades flop wasn't to his liking, however, as he promptly check-folded to the 1,500 bet on the flop.

Tikay has been moaning (in a gentle way, of course) about Marc's persistent calling (and outplaying him on the flop).  A high flop which Tikay bet anyway with his pocket Eights, got an auto-raise from Marc, who happily showed 22 when Tikay got out of the way.... ;)

Paul Jackson is OUT

3-3 vs elblondie's A-J

Ace hit the board

Jim Reid is OUT -

There was a raise and re-raise preflop (sorry, missed that bit) which ended up with Om Aggarwal on the button, and Jim Reid in the big blind waiting to see if John Hewston in mid position would come in too... he thought (out loud) for a while, and looked on the verge of passing, but put in the call to see the flop eventually.  This, incidentally, prompted Iwan Jones to remark dryly, "I wonder what you'd be like if you had an audience..."

Audience or not, Hewston checked the 9c Kh 8s flop after Jim, as did the button, and on the 4h turn Jim's last 4,825 positively flew in straight away.  A slow call from Hewston, which was probably intended to lure in a potential third player, as he'd flopped a set of Eights.  It was not to be - Jim showed Ahrt Qc and is out just before the dinner break.  I am sure it made him feel much better to hear John say, "I almost folded preflop..." as he headed for the door.

5 tables left...

Iwan Jones -- 20,800
Matt Tyler -- 9,450
Greek JAck -- 18,625
Dave Colclough -- 27,200
Olabode Ayegun -- 7,925
Michael Fletcher -- 25,400
Bernard Litman -- 39,800
Jon Exley -- 12,225
Paul King -- 22,200
Nick 'vodkaredbull' Hicks -- 25,300
Michael 'Slick Kid' McCool -- 11,625

Mark Dyson is down to 4.2k after moving in on Arshad Hussain.

The flop was Q-T-2 and, after a very lenghty dwell indeed, Ash called the 4k raise (plus another couple of k on top) with K-Q.

Dyson called the extra shrapnel but couldn't improve on his Pocket Sevens.

Andreas Olympios, Nadim Lodhi, Lee Edwards, Mark Dyson, Colin Porter and Richard Wong are all OUT.

Paul Campbell -- 23,000
Mark Raymer -- 23,800
Ian Roberts -- 21,300
Bernard Litman -- 38,500
Jehan Zaib -- OUT (6-6 vs K-K)
Olabode Ayegun -- 9,400
Michael Fletcher -- 36,400
Dave Colclough -- 25,000
Paul 'Pab' Foltyn -- 13,200
Glenn Ashworth -- 17,600

Stuart Rutter in Shock Threes Out-ing News Now -

After a raise, we think from Hamsterboy and a call from a rather perpetual caller, Stuart on the big blind decided now was the time to pick up 3,000 with a steal-y type all-in re-raise (7,500 more).  He held 3d 3c.  After a while, the original raiser to 1,500 passed, and Stuart was ready to pick up the pot, but no - the guy called, for a good proportion of his stack, with 4s 5s!  A five on the river, and a shocked Rutter comes to tell us what happened...

The announcement has been made - they're playing this level, then one more, and that's your lot for tonight.  The remaining players (whom I reckoned would be two tables, while Jon speculated they'd make the final) will come back tomorrow afternoon.

McCool pushes Greek Jack, who had raised to 2.6 preflop, off A-Q with an all-in. He said he was going to show out of respect, but then didn't, and when questioned about it claimed, "Aah, it's all part of the game".

Anyhow, the chips on that table are now...

Ash Hussain -- 12,800
Greek Jack -- 15,900
Andy Douglas -- 6,100
Sammy Cheung -- 16,300
Paul King -- 20,600
Michael McCool -- 28,800
Jon Exley -- 10,500
Gary David -- hands in the way
R Mulla -- 3,700
Paul Hatton -- 12,400

Table tikay:

Mateyboy -- 25,200
Steve Read -- 10,900
Texas Hewston -- 32,000
Brian Medley -- 6,400
Phil Peters -- 8,400
hamsterboy -- 19,600
Iwan Jones -- 16,400
tikay -- 49,500
Marc Goodwin -- 41,300

John Huckly eliminates Read with a set of sevens vs A-Q

Steve Read pushed for 7k on a 7-K-x flop after raising it up preflop.

Iqbal Patel -- 45,200
Mateyboy -- 6,900
Richard Herbert -- 21,900
David Gent -- 10,500
Mateyboy -- 13,600
vodkaredbull -- 16,100
Womble -- 14,400
Richard Lee - hands in the way
N Peters -- 11,700

Greek Jack is OUT

He moved his shortstack all-in only to be part of a three way pot with Mulla and King.

It was checked all the way down with Mulla taking the pot with J-Ts on a 7-T-7-3-Q board

Mystic Pab just said he sensed some action coming up, and, just as he said the 'p' bit of 'up', we had action on two adjacent tables.

First up was John Hewston reraising Phil Peters all-in for a pretty chunky pot. The board read 8s 4h Jc 6c 7h, Peters foled.

And then el blondie was in the thick of the action. Roberts bet 1.1k on a Ks 9s 5d flop, Fletcher and Dave smooth called. Then Dave bet out 3k (small blind) on the 3c flop, this time it was Roberts who called. Dave checked the Td River and Roberts bet out 6k. Dave called and Roberts revealed a missed straight draw 7d 6d, leaving el blondie to take down the pot with Ts 3s

Paul  'Pab' Foltyn is OUT.

He flopped top pair was up against an open ended straight flush draw, which hit a straight on the turn.

To say Pab's hand was slightly vulnerable would be an understatement.

tikay's stack has taken a dent from Phil Peters, who has doubled up as a result.

A-Q v J-J

All-in on a King high flop, but Peters spiked the Ace on the River. Sounds bad, but Peters did have the Queen of spades on an suited flop.

Gary David doubles up though John Hewston

3-3 vs A-Q

Q-4-5-6-7

Paul Campbell is OUT

Ran Queens into Kings

G Ashworth was the assassin

I passed Paul King 10 minutes ago, and he was down to two chips (both 5k though).  Then, just now, the button raised to 4,700, leaving a rather committed-looking 5,000 behind.  Small blind Paul re-raised all in, and after a think, big blind Mr. McCool went for it.  So, with all three on their backs, the big blind's Aspades Jd was in bad shape against Ac Ahrt and Kc Kd!  The Aces belonged to Paul King, and the board appeared Td 8c 6c 7d 3d, knocking the button out and denting Michael McCool.  All very good sportsmanship though, hand shaking and the like, although I can only imagine how pleasing it is to get the KK on the button, only to find the one bigger hand preflop in the old blinds...

Jon Exley is up to just under 30k after eliminating Mateyboy.

A-K va J-T

Jack hit the flop, but justice was done when the King arrived on the Turn.

Just to confirm some exits:

Zafar Aslam
Tayo Ayegun
Alan Barnacle
Paul Campbell
Gary Chatterton
Greek Jack
Mark Dyson
Lee Edwards
Pab
Paul Jackson
Hanif Kazi
Nadim Lodhi
RED-DOG
Barry Neville
Andreas Olympios
Stephen Pearce
Colin Porter
Steve Read
Jim Reid
Stu Rutter
Peter Smyth
Julian Thew
Mickey Wernick
Jehan Zaib

all OUT

Play has finished for the day.

It does look like they're not going to be very forthcoming with the old printouts/photocopies, so instead of arguing, we're going to concede and go home (well, to the Premier Travel Inn).  I'm sleepy and Snoopy is going to do what I say...

SO we'll be back with the up to date info at 3pm (for the start) - in fact we're going to try to make breakfast at 2pm.  Thanks for watching, and stick those forks in.