Bluesquare.com GUKPT London - Day 1A - At A Glance

[Djinn]

Greetings from The Vic, where Junglecat and I are poised to run down the copious stairs and watch the copious action literally any minute now.  Players are still drifting in and signing their little forms as they pass to the New Improved card room (which isn't actually so new any more, but the first time I saw it was the EPT recently, and it was indeed improved). 

Expect an updater-filled Day One (not a typo - both Danafish and Snoopy1239 are just about to play their first GUKPT event - for the former her first ever big live event) and will undoubtedly get the full, even, unbiased coverage for which blonde is famous.

[JungleCat03]

Now I can finally access the wonderful world of t'internet, may I extend my warmest greetings to you, the amassed blonde faithful.

The Vic is my old stomping ground, yet has changed considerably since my day with worn old carpets and scratched tables having been replaced, refurbished, revamped and polished till everything has a warm glow of luxuriance and sparkle surrounding it.

Much improved from a few years ago, it should be a pleasure updating from the sumptuous environ that the Vic has become.

This promises to be one of the best GUKPTs, with a field that will be chock full of stars, professionals, the odd fish and as Jen related, Snoopy and Dana(I'll let you decide which category to put them in!) will be amongst the throng. (Please let them be sharing a table.....)

The press room is a short trip from the card room, simply up the stairs, down the stairs, turn left, out of the door, through the next door, catch the no 57 bus, short climb up the Andes and you're one small parachute jump away.....(At least i should be getting fit)

Anyway, Jen has joined the ranks to catch the early action, and I will be joining her now to assist so here we go, good luck everyone!

[JungleCat03]

I was wandering around, looking for interesting tables yet bemoaning the fact I couldn't find an interesting hand, when Sharplea, one of the other updaters tapped me on the shoulder to tell me to stop looking gormless and cover Snoopy's ALLIN!

Yes, you heard me right, blonde's own busy beagle had found all his chips in the middle at this early stage.

It looked as though most of the action occurred on the river of a board. With about 2k in the pot the river action seemed to have gone, Snoopy had bet 1.5k, his opponent who i believe was Lam Trihn, raised this to 3.5k and snoopy pushed the rest of his chips into the pot which I would guess was about another 5k or so.....

Lam thought for ages, looked uncomfortable, and ultimately made the call. An impassive, headphoned snoopy, showed AT quietly for the nuts, whilst a headshaking Lam flashed either QT or KT for the 2nd nut straight. A nice early result for Snoopy who must be close to the 20k  mark! Keep up Dana he may be thinking (this is idle speculation on my part of course!)

[Djinn]

Pre-recap of early action, I think it best to get the tedious spreadsheet creation out of the way, and at the same time get the full list of players blondewards.

The In Seat First Hand Silly Rule is no more, which also means that alternates are being accepted and will mess up this list a little bit by Level Two, but never mind - here are most of them, in seat order:

Table 1

1. Daniel Lewis
2. Osman Mustanoglu
3. JP Kelly
4. Peter Evans
5. John Reynolds
6. Dan Smith
7. Norman Jones
8. Robert Stain
9. Adam Wilkinson

Table 2

1. Zuhair Razook
2. Ken Garden
3. Marc Goodwin
4. Charles Denton
5. Richard Simmonds
6. Nick Gibson
7. Adam Vinson
8. Rumit Somaiya
9. Danny Dborin

Table 3

1. Jon Lundy
2. John Ioannou
3. S. Nikkhah
4. Thomas Dunwoodie
5. Dana Immanuel
6. Neil Robbins
7. Paul Ephremsen
8. Necmettin Cicekli
9. Mark Tomblin

Table 4

1. M. Bale
2. Guy Steele
3. Lee Redmond
4. Paul Alterman
5. Mike Chen
6. Paul Murrell
7. Marc Lousky
8. Christopher M. Pan
9. Richard Grace

Table 5

1. Lawrence Windish
2. John Gale
3. Ryan Fronda
4. Trevor Pearson
5. Jack Powell
6. Samir Patel
7. James Moult
8. Adam Heller
9. Raymond Nicholas

Table 6

1. John Murphy
2. Jeffrey Rogers
3. Jeff Buffenbarger
4. David Halsey
5. A. Johnson
6. Simon Mcdonagh
7. Sean Moran
8. Zack Chesses
9. Steven Hill

Table 7

1. Sultan Mahmud
2. Patrick Murray
3. W. Nosko
4. P. Mehmet
5. Lawrence Gosney
6. Mohammed Shafique
7. Eamon Delany
8. Marcus Bebb-jones
9. Damon Ioannou

Table 8

1. Tony Bedford
2. Michael Denton
3. Paul King
4. Barney Boatman
5. Paul McIntyre
6. Paul Hardwidge
7. Robert Jones
8. Paul Gourlay
9. Terence Mcgilly

Table 9

1. Bardi Rajah
2. Philip Dorrington
3. Allan Mclean
4. Talal Shakerchi
5. Donald Mccallion
6. Craig Owen
7. Bhupinder Kohli
8. Hoa Ngo
9. Bernard Litman

Table 10

1. James Mcbride
2. Debbie Littlejohn
3. Dave Colclough
4. Joshua Biedak
5. Andrew Booth
6. Gary Nordigan
7. Lisa Scotney
8. Brian Gilbert
9. Hieu Hoang

Table 11

1. Dean Sanders
2. Simon Eastwood
3. Andrew Cruickshank
4. Peter Hedlund
5. Mark Segal
6. Alexander Martin
7. Stephen Basri
8. Jimmy Gallagher
9. Michael Ellis

Table 12

1. Nik Persaud
2. Lam Trinh
3. Paul Dobson
4. Jan Lundberg
5. Darren Fuller
6. Adam Goulding
7. Paul Cohen
8. Peter Rogers
9. Nicholas Cherbanich

Table 13

1. Adam Stoneham
2. Rory Liffey
3. Jeff Kimber
4. Michael Greco
5. Antonio Volpe
6. John Hewston
7. Ian Nelson
8. Alan Vinson
9.

Table 14

1. Paul Leckey
2. Ian Woodley
3. Carl Buskirk
4. Dan Carter
5. Nick Holbrook
6. Glen Martin
7. Robert Boon
8. Steven Walden
9.

Table 15

1. Yilfer Shevket
2. M. McElhinney
3. Rory Campbell
4. Kastriot Krasniqi
5. Bambos Xanthos
6. Erling Marthinsen
7. Ronald Seymour
8. Matt Tyler
9.

[JungleCat03]

The most interesting table I noticed was table 13, as mentioned which is likely to be unlucky for some.

Adam Stoneham, Rory Liffey, Jeff Kimber, Michael Greco, Antonio Volpe, John Hewston, Ian Nelson and Alan Vinson make up what has been dubbed in the press room "THE TABLE OF DEATH"

Every player on the table has a well earned reputation and I'll be keeping a close eye on this one as the chips will undoubtedly fly between assorted World Heads Up Champions, famous ex-eastender stars and flame-haired and highly aggressive poker players.....

In the time taken to post this, given the short connection-less hiatus we just experienced in the press room, Ian Nelson is OUT!

As predicted the TABLE OF DEATH has claimed its first victim...

On a , Adam Stonham bet 2.5k and Ian Nelson moved in. Quickly called by Adam, Ian showing T8 for top 2 pair, but Adam's AA gave him a superior 2 pair and a blank river sent Ian crashing to the rail.....

[Djinn]

Osman Mustanoglu is OUT, after tangling with Ian Woodley (pictured at a previous event in a more pleasingly garish T-shirt than he's wearing today).

It looked like Mustanoglu had raised and found Woodley and another player looking up the flop.  I caught the action from when 1,525 appeared in front of Woodley, only to find a check-raise to 4,525 coming from his opponent.  A pretty quick move all-in from Woodley, and Osman Mustanoglu called, with that old chestnut, "If you got it, you got it..."

He had it: to Mustanoglu's .  22,000 for Ian Woodley, the rail for Mustanoglu.

Incidentally, the brief recap given by the exiter to pal Rumit Somaiya perfectly sums up how busted players can tell a story in such a way that they seem most hard done by.  "Pair of Kings vs. Ace-Queen.  He made a flush on me."  Just the right amount of ambiguity to imply horrible outdrawing and potential donkeying on the part of the opponent. 

___________________________________________________

Snoopy might be the level One chip leader, but his special lady friend is up a few thousand too - thanks to some well-timed good cards (Aces, first hand).  She raised preflop and found one caller in position on her in the form of Mark Tomblin.  She bet the flop of , and then 500 on the turn.  The river brought the 5k and she once again bet out, this time 1k, called by Tomblin with his shown , while here Instaboots - took the first good-sized pot.

[Djinn]

Also making an early exit was Mohammed Shafiq, whose final hand, I noted, was .  The beneficiary of most of his chips looked to be Patrick Murray, who'd ended up with a higher flush and may have been the player who said as soon as Shaf was out of earshot, "Well he shouldn't be playing them cards then should he..." implying, probably rightly, that he'd gotten himself into trouble raising with 'interesting' starting hands, as is his modus operandi.

[Djinn]

Passing Dan Carter's table, and he says as the cards are dealt, "Hang on, I've got Aces here..." He limped as did Richard Grace, and blinds Paul Murrell and Marc Lousky.
Flop:   Small blind Murrell bet out 275, called by Lousky.  Grace then raised to 900 - over to last to act Dan Carter, who pondered for a minute before re-raising to 2,500.  Three instafolds later and another pot to the Kid.  "Nice flop for Aces," he continues, despite the fact that that wasn't what he held at all.

[JungleCat03]

Jeff Kimber looks like he has lost a few jaffacakes, appearing to have around 5k. I was just about to have a quick chat with the Heads Up supremo, when Barry Neville appeared, larger than life and twice as ugly, guzzling the hot buffet.

"ere, you gotta try t'chicken, it's luoovly". I accede to the request happily and can confirm that indeed the hot buffet being handed round amongst players and thieving press members such as myself, is immensely tasty. Congrats to the Vic catering staff.

As you may have guessed from my inane culinary ramblings I am somewhat short on interesting poker details.

Just to bring you up to date there are 113 players remaining out of the initial 130/131 (one player is likely to be removed shortly for non-appearance) and the current level is 50 100. Average stack is at 11,600

Dana and Snoops both remain in, ahead of the current average.

I join snoops for a quick chat. He looks happy following his early double up. Nick Persaud (who is un-bespectacled today) makes a raise and shows AQ. "It's an easy game, if I raise I've got a big ace or a big pair"

"Or 83" adds Snoopy laconically to a few chuckles....

Here we see the lens-less Nikhil Persaud...

[JungleCat03]

Barny Boatman has bitten the dust. After his near big result, and cash in Barcelona, he was an unfortunate victim of mateyboy...

Holding 66 on a 6 A x A flop and turn, Barny pushed allin and his optimistic opponent called with....not the Ace as expected but QQ?

A dagger-to-heart-like queen on the river though, gave him the higher full house and sent the unfortunate mobster spiralling out of the tournament.

The players are enjoying a short break now and the atmosphere is convivial as players enjoy the lovely buffet and swap funny stories with each other.

I suspect that given a few days of climbing the umpteen flights of stairs between card room and press room, I will have calves like an olympic sprinter and will thus be resigning as a blonde updater to become a professional sock model.

Here is the first photo of my future CV. All suggestions welcome....

[Djinn]

A couple of selected chip updates before we get the full whack courtesy of the wonderful Raabian Break Counting System:

Adam Stoneham -- 8,800
Alex Martin -- 12,350
Matt Tyler -- 22,000
Snoopy -- 16,750
Jeff Kimber -- 7,050
Michael Greco -- 13,700
Marc Goodwin -- 12,800
Dave Colclough -- 9,700
Paul King -- 9,525
Jeffrey Rogers -- 19,000
JP Kelly -- 21,500
Paul Gourlay -- 8,200

[Djinn]

Big pot for Nik Persaud:  His opponent - Nicholas Cherbanich, who was in the cutoff vs. Persaud on the button, on a board of .  There was already about 6k in the pot (which is what draws updaters like free coffee)...and now check to Nik who bets 3k.  Pretty fast call.
River: .  Bit of a dwell from Cherbanich, who then asks, "Can you beat two pair?"
"Have you checked?" rejoinders Nik.
"I was asking can you beat two pair..." Pause. "Check."
Nik moves all in for his last remaining 3,275.  Back to Cherbanich who thinks for a while longer before deciding that Nik wouldn't risk it with nothing, and passes.

_______________________________________________________________

Blind vs. bllind Blitz

People are going out all over the place on the blinds against the other blinds at the moment.  In the case of Bambos flopping Aces full on the small blind and getting his opponent's whole stack in, apparently, on a flush draw, that stands to reason.  Elsewhere the action kicks off preflop - Christopher Pan re-raises all in on the big blind for 3,075 (after an initial thousand came in from small blind Marc Lousky).  Lousky topped up his bet to call, and showed against the all-in player's .  The flop brought , and all hope for the straight chop vanished when the and then totally irrelevant came next.  Quite a bit of table reshuffling has already been going on, and it looks like a pretty fast start to this leg of the GUKPT.

[Djinn]

Richard Simmonds has a bit of a wincing exit with ... it looks like he was the aggressor until the turn with his only opponent being Glen Martin.  I caught this hand just as the was coming down to join the and already flopped.  Glen Martin then moved in, and it was just a small stack which Simmonds had left to shove with his Aces, only to be shown which had raced firmly into the lead with the second Jack falling.  Another one out.

[Djinn]

Chip Counts in Chip Order... (from the end of the first break)

Denton, Charles    38325
Cicekli, Necmettin  25425
Shakerchi, Talal  24150
Woodley, Ian   24100
Owen, Craig  24000
Tyler, Matthew   23225
Heller, Adam   22350
Xanthos, Charalambos   22325
Robbins, Neil   21500
Kelly, John-paul  21450
Mcgilly, Terence  21425
Moran, Sean  21350
Boon, Robert  21275
Jones, Robert  21100
Mehmet, P  18550
Rogers, Jeffrey   18475
Moult, James   18425
Goulding, Adam   17875
Hoang, Hieu  17575
Campbell, Rory   17325
Vinson, Alan  17275
Bebb-jones, Marcus  17025
Gibson, Nick   16000
Nosko, W  15950
Rajah, Bardi   15850
Gallagher, Jimmy  14850
Ioannou, John   14800
Grace, Richard   14800
Somaiya, Rumit   14775
Lewis, Daniel   14600
Murray, Patrick   14400
Ioannou, Damon   14275
Carter, Daniel   14025
Lundberg, Jan   13800
Greco, Michael   13750
Lundy, Jon  13675
Delany, Eamon   13500
Alterman, Paul   13375
Wilkinson, Adam   13275
Gale, John  13100
Goodwin, Marc   12900
Krasniqi, Kastriot   12625
Dorrington, Philip   12475
Martin, Alexander   12450
Volpe, Antonio   11875
Steele, Guy   11775
Rogers, Peter   11775
Eastwood, Simon Joseph   11725
Hedlund, Peter   11575
Gilbert, Brian   11325
Nikkhah, S   11200
Booth, Andrew   11200
Liffey, Rory   11125
Seymour, Ronald   11000
Immanuel, Dana   10875
Dobson, Paul   10750
Mcdonagh, Simon   10475
Halsey, David   10375
Persaud, Nikhil   10375
Hewston, John   10300
Bale, M   10275
Scotney, Lisa   10250
Cherbanich, nicholas   10200
Sanders, Dean   10050
King, Paul   9675
Ngo, Hoa   9675
Dunwoodie, Thomas   9250
Murphy, John   9025
Colclough, David   8975
Cohen, Paul   8825
Ellis, Michael   8725
Kohli, Bhupinder   8700
Lousky, Marc   8475
Cruickshank, Andrew   8375
Powell, Jack   8250
Martin, Glen   8150
Stoneham, Adam   8150
Gourlay, Paul   8100
Hill, Steven   8000
Evans, Peter   7950
Basri, Stephen   7850
Stain, Robert   7450
Hardwidge, Paul   7250
Fronda, Ryan   7225
Murrell, Paul   7200
Tse, Chen   6875
Mahmud, Sultan   6850
Reynolds, John   6675
Windish, Lawrence   6575
Denton, Michael   6425
Shevket, Yilfer   6275
Biedak, Joshua   6225
Buskirk, Carl   6100
Kimber, J   5975
Nicholas, Raymond   5350
Dborin, Danny   5200
Pearson, Trevor   5100
Fuller, Darren   4975
Mcelhinney, M   4825
Segal, Mark   4400
Simmonds, Richard   4100
Chesses, Zack   3700
Walden, Steven   3000
Pan, Christopher M   2825
Nordigan, Gary   2600
Holbrook, Nick   2525
Leckey, Paul   2425
Patel, Samir   2275
Vinson, Adam   1375

[JungleCat03]

Had a quick chat with Alex Martin...

"Yeah doing ok" he tells me. "Er I rivered a full house against a made flush" and begins giggling like a naughty schoolboy. I'm guessing a fair few of the chips went in when he was behind then!

Nonetheless, Alex looks composed and focused and had time in between talking to me to quickly raise the button and pick up the blinds.

It seems during my time updating for blonde I have been unable to avoid Barry soundbites but for good or bad, he does draw action round him like a magnet. As I pass by JP Kelly's table which has been supplemented by the presence of Jeff Kimber and Ian Woodley, Barry(who plays tomorrow but is happy to wind everyone up today) is causing mischief by giving Ian Woodley a hard time.

"Ave you seen me wife?" says Barry pointing at one of the attractive waitresses...

"Has she seen you!" fires Woodley back. "Can you get this annoying northener out of my face" pleads Ian to one of the staff. "We need a barrier.....and a bloody big one at that!" Barry laughs before wandering off to annoy Michael Greco.

Meanwhile a hand develops between Jeff Kimber and Daniel Lewis. The preflop action is unknown but facing a big bet on a 9 5 5 rainbow flop, Jeff Kimber folds and shows Q Q. His opponent flips over 99 for a flopped house and Jeff's made an excellent laydown there to save his tournament. He's earnt himself a jaffacake or two with that one.