Up at 5:30am Saturday morning, train to the airport, check in to an 8:15am flight to Melbourne. Familiar faces everywhere. 56 of Sydney's best and/or luckiest poker players on their way to Crown Casino to play in an $85,000 tournament. We've all won our weekend in Melbourne as prizes in a series of satellite tourneys in Sydney pubs over the past few weeks. The waiting lounge is a buzz with stories of flops, turns, raises, donkeys, and bad beats.
I chat to a guy that I tried to knock out of the satellite tournament. He beat me in that hand, but I managed to claw my way back, and scrape through with only three big blinds left on the bubble.
On arrival at Melbourne airport we're greeted by a Crown Casino host, and shown to our coach that will take us to the Crowne Plaza Hotel. Not quite the life of the high roller, but the first time a casino host has greeted me at the airport nonetheless ;-)
Over 200 local Melbourne players register for the tournament, and by the time the tournament is underway we have 284 players and a huge $85,000 prize pool. I'm seated at one of the outer tables. The guy to my immediate left is a local player, Antonio Casale, who has apparently played in the Crown Poker room every day for eons, and had cashed for $300,000 in this year's Aussie Millions poker tournament. Two seats to his left is a Sydney player, Patrick Fletcher, who had finished 2nd in a tournament at Star City the night before for a cool $31,000. No luck on the first table, I call a couple of raises but fold both times on the flop. On one hand everyone folds to me in the big blind. I look down at pocket kings, the only time I picked up a pocket pair greater than eights in the entire tournament (and even when I did get the pocket eights I had to fold pre-flop because of the action).
After a couple of hours I get moved to the main table, which is set up with overhead cameras and a rail with a small but dedicated crowd. Despite the deep starting stack, the tournament has an aggressive structure. I push all-in a few times without getting any callers. The blinds continue to increase and I'm constantly short-stacked. People are dropping like flies, and before I even realise it, we're down to about 45 players remaining, with the top 30 making the prize money. I'm still short-stacked. A player limps. I stare him down, then re-raise all-in with only A7. He reluctantly calls with K9. I knew he was weak, but I didn't think he'd call my raise. My Ace high hand holds up and I've now got a few chips to play with.
The blinds continue to increase. With 33 players remaining, I've got pocket sevens in mid-position. The blinds are 6000 / 12000 with a 1000 ante. We're playing eight-handed, so there's 26000 in the pot before any action. I raise all-in with only 27,000. The action folds to the big blind. He's only got about 30,000 remaining. It's going to cost him half his stack to call, but he's getting better than 4 to 1 on his money if he makes the call. He thinks for ages, and eventually folds. I've now got 53,000 and it's enough to make it to the money bubble.
With the incredibly aggressive blind structure, it's anyone's game. I raise/fold my way to the final fifteen. The blinds are now at 15000/30000 with a 3000 ante and the average stack is about 190,000. After posting my big blind and my ante I have 67000 remaining. A guy in early position min-raises to 60000. It folds to me and I have QJ. There's so much money in the pot, the prize structure is the same for 11th through to 20th, so I need to accumulate chips to make it to the final table. I decide to just call, with the intention of then betting out on the flop. Depending on how he plays, and how the flop comes out, there's a small chance he might fold on the flop. The flop comes out Q and two lower cards. Bingo. Great outcome for me! I bet my remaining 37000 into the 141000 chip pot. The guy is agonised, but calls with pocket 3s. "I had to call, there's so much in the pot" "Yeah, I know" The turn is meaningless. I'm now a 95% chance to win the pot, but a 3 falls on the river and I'm out in 15th place for a little over $1000. I always seem to get sucked out on at Crown ;-)
He ends up winning the entire tournament, taking home the trophy and over $17,000 ;-)
Our NSW contingent did very well, with five people making it to the final table, including 2nd, 3rd, and 5th place.
