Low stakes cash hand vs Matt Frankland

[david3103]

Local casino and Matt Frankland is home for a visit and has been on a night out before joining the .25/.50 table. He appears sober and to be taking it fairly seriously. Sat with the max of £200 on a table where stacks ranged from £30 to c£350.
First time I've met him but his record and reputation are obviously good.
Two hands of minor interest so far, one where he called a preflop raise and checked to the river where he made a small bet (into a tiny pot) on the 4 river holding A4. Called by AK and good.
The second he called a river bet of £26 with third pair poor kicker and was again good.
He's also flatted a couple of small raises and folded to aggression pre and opened a few pots himself.
As you'd expect he's very comfortable with himself in this game.

Hand in question Matt opens to £3 from utg+2, I raise from BB with   playing just over £200 and we go to the flop HU
Flop   (£25)

I check, I wouldn't always but I expect him to float most boards and OOP I don't want a big pot to develop.

Turn is   I check again and Matt bets £13.75. Calling feels obligatory since I'd expect him to have bet any pair, set or two pair type hands on the flop. Few if any sevens in his range?

River    (£52.50)

Now, I have the  , is leading here good?
Or check raising?

Or do we just check and give up?

edit: I did check, he bet £43 on the river

[BulldozerD]

Wouldn't 3bet pre here vs someone as good as him who is never likely to fold.

As played give up and play pots with the other people at the table imo. You would surely bet the flop with NFD in a 3 bet flop.

[George2Loose]

I would flat Matt pre here and call most c bets. Seems in keeping u don't want to play a big pot with him.

Also I'd just c/f the turn.

[bobAlike]

I'd fold now as played but I don't see why you wouldn't 3bet pre in this spot against someone who's raise/calling range is going to be so wide.

Can someone enlighten me?

[George2Loose]

You're playing a pot oop against the only decent player on the table. Like dean said he's just gonna peel a load. Betting lead counts for little if you're just gonna check twice

[bobAlike]

You're playing a pot oop against the only decent player on the table. Like dean said he's just gonna peel a load. Betting lead counts for little if you're just gonna check twice

Sorry my bad, I read it as villain was OOP.

[Nit Tendencies]

I don't like depolarising vs someone as good as Franky playing about 6 billion levels lower than his skill level; he's going to make life hell for us.

It's good to have hands this strong in our peeling range vs opponents who are going to put a lot of pressure on us on A high boards since in theory they are better for is range than ours.

I think once you get to the turn you've thought about the hand in the wrong kind of way.

I check again and Matt bets £13.75. Calling feels obligatory since I'd expect him to have bet any pair, set or two pair type hands on the flop

Franky is an accomplished cash game player and will definitely check back a lot of his one pair (if not all) hands because he expects you to bet the flop with your overpairs and flush draws most of the time, so you're either going for the c/r with the nut flush draw in which case he really doesn't want to be blown off his showdown value if he has 77, 6x, 8x or something similar. SO when he checks back I'm a lot more worried than if he had bet since a bet would be polarised between bluffs, semi bluffs and nutted hands which makes our hand a decent bluff catcher bearing in mind that he'll barrel club turns which we can continue on.

So as played I like the flop check, but once he checks back i'm done with the hand unless we turn a club, A or Q. Just c/f turn and don't think too much about it.

Oh and as far as c/r or lead river goes, that's complete suicide. We've taken this bluff catchy line so we don't get bluffed on dry runouts, but it does turn our hand face up (as AK/AQ) so if you start trying to rep something else Franky is quickly going to smell a rat and call/jam.

Whenever you are considering a bluff, you have to think about the story your selling, and if t's consistent with the story you've told on the previous streets. In this case, we've told Franky we have a bluff catcher, so we can't now take off on rivers which are good for his range and terrible for ours. I think this thought process was just a case of "I don't want to lose this pot, how can I not lose this pot" which we are all a victim of at some point.

[GreekStein]

For me it's an obligatory turn fold.

[david3103]

I don't like depolarising vs someone as good as Franky playing about 6 billion levels lower than his skill level; he's going to make life hell for us.

It's good to have hands this strong in our peeling range vs opponents who are going to put a lot of pressure on us on A high boards since in theory they are better for is range than ours.

I think once you get to the turn you've thought about the hand in the wrong kind of way.

I check again and Matt bets £13.75. Calling feels obligatory since I'd expect him to have bet any pair, set or two pair type hands on the flop

Franky is an accomplished cash game player and will definitely check back a lot of his one pair (if not all) hands because he expects you to bet the flop with your overpairs and flush draws most of the time, so you're either going for the c/r with the nut flush draw in which case he really doesn't want to be blown off his showdown value if he has 77, 6x, 8x or something similar. SO when he checks back I'm a lot more worried than if he had bet since a bet would be polarised between bluffs, semi bluffs and nutted hands which makes our hand a decent bluff catcher bearing in mind that he'll barrel club turns which we can continue on.

So as played I like the flop check, but once he checks back i'm done with the hand unless we turn a club, A or Q. Just c/f turn and don't think too much about it.

Oh and as far as c/r or lead river goes, that's complete suicide. We've taken this bluff catchy line so we don't get bluffed on dry runouts, but it does turn our hand face up (as AK/AQ) so if you start trying to rep something else Franky is quickly going to smell a rat and call/jam.

Whenever you are considering a bluff, you have to think about the story your selling, and if t's consistent with the story you've told on the previous streets. In this case, we've told Franky we have a bluff catcher, so we can't now take off on rivers which are good for his range and terrible for ours. I think this thought process was just a case of "I don't want to lose this pot, how can I not lose this pot" which we are all a victim of at some point.

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[Tal]

Incredibly - and I don't say this often, given how I apparently play hands - NitTendencies has said exactly what I was going to say.

However, I prefer 3betting pre (as played), especially if he is calling wide but this needs to be just some of the time.

Your check on the flop defines your hand pretty well, though (3b/check seems pretty AceQueeny), so a bluff on the river is never going to work.

[Nit Tendencies]

For me it's an obligatory turn fold.

In depth analysis from that odd Greek guy here.

[wazz]

Jamies nailed it again

[GreekStein]

For me it's an obligatory turn fold.

In depth analysis from that odd Greek guy here.

Im just disappointed Franky isn't battered!

[pleno1]

Would absolutely 3bet pre flop for pure value would rather have a strong depolarised 3bettign range here at least with a younger image.

As yourself who is abit older everyone just changes a bunch though.

[david3103]

I wish I hadn't started this thread now.
I obviously appreciate the advice and thoughts and take them on board but now I'm faced with being 6,000,000,000 levels below someone who many poker players haven't even heard of, and to cap that, I'm old!

I dwelled on the river and eventually folded having decided that I was right with my read that Matt had a similar hand to mine, ie AQ/AJ/A10 and that I was only winning vs one of those.
I showed the though and suggested that a shove would have been hard for him to call and he declared that he had the same hand as me with no clubs but that the club on the river was a good card for him to rep. He suggested that he'd have folded had I lead the river, or had I check raised.
He may have been fibbing.

It's tricky because I won't get many chances to play against people like Matt at stakes that I am comfortable with and I didn't want to avoid him because if we don't test ourselves we don't learn or improve. I picked a bad spot to get involved though, should have just kept raising his BB from the cut off really, that might have been fun.