Harrington on Holdem Vol 2 has an outstanding section on heads-up tournament play.

Essentially, heads-up tournament play is all about confidence, and having a good handle on what your opponent will do in certain situations. How often does he raise pre-flop? How often does he give up his blind? Does he bet at flops often enough to signify that he's doing it even when he misses? How does he respond to your bets at the flop?

In a high-blind structure, it's all about who can grab most blinds. Do this more often than your opponent and you'll win. With lower blinds, you can afford to leave your stealing until the flop. Oddly enough, opponents will pick up on your stealing here less often that they will pre-flop. Pre-flop, even the dumbest of opponents will eventually cotton on to the fact that, when you raise their big blind every hand, you're probably not just doing it with decent hands. Whereas on the flop, he's going to miss twice as often as he hits, and it can be quite feasible that you've hit it in some way. This will allow you to pick up a lot of pots and gradually increase your stack.

Forgot to thank pokerram for alerting us all to the tournament. That was the first time I've ever played on Pokerstars - doubt many people on the network have a 100% record in MTTs 

Cool, made it through. Once we were down to 4 players I ended the tourney in two hands.

First called down what I suspected to be bluff -raise with only T9 on a 6442 board. Hit a nine on the river. Next hand had AK, and the BB liked his K9 on a K-high flop.

Thanks for all the support buys.

Still there - on break - 6 left- I'm still chip leader (76K, others 68K, 50K and 3 shorties).

Thanks for the reminder Kev, getting a bit of a tailwind...

Just flopped a nut flush to knock out a short stack and move up to 2nd

I'm in as CremeEgg - currently 6th, but it's been a bit up and down. Got amazing cards early on and hit every flop - things have gone a bit colder now.

I think I did miss something obvious - the straights.

KK v K2 rings a bell, provided the suits are arranged to minimise the K2 hitting a flush.

At the risk of missing something obvious, I'd say it was two red aces against a black ace and a red king.

Congratulations Gamblor on getting the seat. That makes it at least two Blondites to make the Will Hill Grand Prix :-) . When I qualified a few weeks ago Will Hill sent me an email on the Tuesday morning - they'll ask for a little bit of info to put up on the website, plus a photo (though they haven't put mine up yet - probably a good thing :-)

Didn't see this thread until this morning, but you must have played well to beat Blackkat, she's a very good player who I've played live with a few times, and has previously qualified for two offline tourneys through Will Hill.

I'll be down there this weekend. A few SNGs tonight (whilst drinking lemonade - heavy night last night) then the big event on Saturday. It should be a lot of fun, provided the Total Poker boys don't get too out of hand.

There is a general problem in international football at the moment which is any half-decent manager can take a bunch of mediocre players, give them a system which says 'get behind the ball and frustrate the opposition' and watch them stifle the 'big' teams through good organisation (this is how Greece won Euro 2004).

The problem the 'big' teams have is that the smaller teams are proving more difficult to break down, managers are having a hard time coming up with 'systems' to counteract this. What not many of them realise is that these games are won through moments of individual brilliance, not solid teamwork. This is why Brazil hardly ever have any problems against smaller teams - they have a squad full of flair and creativity, and the manager simply picks 11 players, tells them to go out and be Brazilian, and watches from the dugout, smoking a cigar, whilst his team unlock the opposition.

Sven is too hung up on his systems (and, crucially, the press are as well, compounding the problem). What England are missing is a Claude Makelele - someone who will sit in front of the back four and deal with any problems. This gives the attacking players more free rein to try things out without worrying too much about it going wrong - it gives them the freedom to experiment. They don't have to worry about the system.  Sven is frustrated by the fact that hardly any English player plays in this position for his club.

On Will Hill it's Flick, though I wasn't playing last night, was railbirding someone else whilst I watched the football.

Prewie - that name rings a bell from last night's comp.

Early on, did you get a whole load of chips by catching a muppet straight? And then winning a more conventional pot a few hands later and said 'that one was for the purists' or something after you took a bit of stick for the straight.

I thought that comment was a bit 'blondite'...

I'm in as Flick