Poker Hand of the Week Setup
Our Poker Hand of the Week is brandnew and comes from the massive Triton Poker London Cash Game Episode 3 with blinds of £3,000/£6,000. The lineup is an action-packed mix of high stakes crushers such as Tom Dwan and Elton Tsang and rich Chinese businessmen such as Quiang Wiang.
Elton Tsang and Yu Liang are both regulars at the Triton Poker events and know each other’s game very well, since they played a lot together before.
Poker Hand of the Week Action
Preflop Action:
Elton Tsang finds J♥J♣ on the button. A very nice spot in a short-handed cash game and he raises to £15,000.
Yu Liang also picks up a pocket pair 8♣8♠ as does Qiang Wang in the big blind with 6♥6♦. Pot size: £49,000
Flop:
The flop 7♠3♠8♥ is a dream for Yu Liang as he flops top set. He and Wang both check to the raiser Elton Tsang, who bets £31,000 into £49,000.
Action is back on Liang and since it is a very draw-heavy board, he decides to protect his hand with a check-raise to £90,000, Elton calls and there are already and there are already £229,000 in the pot!
Turn:
The 7♣ on the turn is a good card for both players as it makes Yu a full house, but also for Tsang as Liang’s check-raise range includes a lot of sevens such as Pocket Sevens or A-7 and it makes it less likely that he has one of these hands.
Liang now takes over the betting lead and bets £60,000 with £275,000 behind, which is less than the £289k potsize.
Because of the board pairing and the fact that Yu Liang has less than pot left, Tsang decides to move All-In and gets snap-called. Pot size: £899,000 ($1,129,373)
River:
Elton has only two outs, the 4♦ is not one of them and a massive $1,129,373 pot is shipped to Yu Liang.
Poker Hand of the Week Analysis
This hand is obviously a pretty big setup. Nevertheless, we want to have an in-depth look, if Elton Tsang really needs to go broke here. This is, where history and having reads on your opponent come into play.
Only from watching the first two season Triton Cash Game episodes, it is already very clear that Yu Liang is the tighest and most conservative player at this table. He plays by far the lowest number of hands and never gets out of line in a big pot.
Nevertheless, the flop is an absolute dream for Yu, as it is very draw-heavy and people like to check-raise on such boards with draws or middle pair. He knows that and uses it to make his hand look like a draw as well as for the change to get it in against overpairs.
Tsang can obviously not fold here. His options are raising and make potential draws pay or call in position and look, what happens on the turn, which he does.
The pair on the turn is almost as nasty for Elton as the flop as it makes it much less likely that Liang has a hand such as Pocket Sevens or 87s for Top Two Pair.
Poker Hand of the Week Conclusion
This significantly decreases the amount of value hands Liang has and at the same time increases the likelihood of a semi-bluff or bluff, if and here comes the big if Yu Liang would be an aggressive player, but as mentioned above, he is by far the tightest player at the table.
Given how tight Yu Liang is, he simply won’t have enough bluffs here and almost always has a full house/the nuts, so instead of moving All-in on the turn, a nitty fold could have saved Elton £335,000.
The decision on the turn is very player and reads-dependant. against an aggressive or loose player, this is a call, but against a nitty TAG or rock, a fold is often the better option, when you are not pot-comitted, as they will almost always have you beat in a multiway pot.
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Watch the Poker Hand of the Week here from 5:33 on:
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