How to play a weak hand strongly
Playing a hand which is weak is not somthing you would normally decide to do in most circumstances, there are some moments of course though, when a hand has the possibility to improve, but is weak until it does. If I have four cards to a flush on the flop in a Holdem game, I really want to be seeing the turn and hopefully river, quite cheaply. Opponents in poker though do not usually like to give the chance for draws to improve and so I must disguise the weakness of my hand.
If my opponent is first to act then of course I’m hoping he checks, and not necessarily so that I might check behind him too. I basically expect him to raise, but if he doesn’t, then I will. This is firstly because if I check too, then the third suited card comes down to make my flush, how am I possibly going to bet out, without my hand looking like exactly what it is to my oppponent. They will read it like a book. Also if I miss my flush on the turn, my previous check makes me look weak, which of course I am, and I can hardly re raise them or call a strong bet when I have one shot left to make a flush.
For me, if your opponent checks on the flop, you have to bet out, you have to make your opponent think you connected with the flop in some way other than just picking up a big draw. If your opponent raises you here first, a small re raise is ok but you are opening the door to having your opponent push all in over the top of you, and if you are sitting there with four cards to a flush, that’s a tough decision to make.
The advantage of playing your weak draw this way though, is that it disguises your hand better, if you make your flush, your opponent will hardly think you re raised on the flop with just a big draw.
So overall I would say be aggressive with weak hands that have potential. The only exception to this in my opinion is if you are playing somthing like suited connectors in the hole, and have the chance to see a flop cheaply.
Review on pokeroom.co.uk
Pokeroom.co.uk is a popular site which has been around for about seven years.
During this time it has managed to build up a good level of player traffic, and come up with numerous promotions and tournaments to keep it’s players happy.
Graphically Pokeroom is very smooth and looks good, with avatars and table backgrounds giving a professional feel.
In terms of first time bonus offers, 100% is given, which is very reasonable and alongside this, first time plays get three entries to a ‘welcome’ tournament, solely for new players.
www.Pokeroom.co.uk offers a great many tournaments to it’s players, with all the regular major tournament qualifiers, money added tournaments and freerolls you would expect from top online poker rank sites.
The games offered at Pokeroom are of a good variety, the usual Holdem tables are available, along with Omaha, stud and also five card draw. This should provide most online poker players with the type of game they are searching for, as these are offered at varied levels, in Limit, No Limit, and Pot Limit formats.
Pokeroom.co.uk does not accept U.S players as many sites do not these days, but otherwise the negative points are scarce on this site. www.Pokeroom.co.uk also offers support for new players, and tutorials to help them get started, which makes for a good site to begin playing online poker on.
If you are a more experienced player, then the qualifiers and gauranteed tournaments, along with the general good quality of the site, should certainly keep you happy at Pokerroom.
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Playing poker at Fulltiltpoker.com
Fulltiltpoker.com is highly regarded as one of the finest sites online to play poker on.
It has a team of sponsored pros which makes up some of the finest players in the world today, and playing poker at Fulltiltpokercom is a great experience, just as you would expect with such endorsements.
They have online poker rank tournaments with great prizes such as a seat in many different major land based tournaments, and some outstanding gaurantee tournaments with satellites starting at only a few hundred points.
www.fulltiltpoker.com also has a good V.I.P system in progress and a very competitive cash match first time bonus of 100%. These many different bonuses onsite make it a great poker playing experience and keeps the players coming back for more.
The software offers reliable and regulated gameplay for players, and the player traffic is of the highest standard too. Progressive jackpots are also in operation here and often grow to very large amounts, along with special tournaments and poker games at every level and variation of game you would expect.
Overall playing online poker at fulltiltpoker.com is one of the best experiences online I feel.
The graphics, dependability, bonuses for the beginner and established player, and ongoing promotions amongst everything else, embellish an already good poker playing experience. All the help and support you need is operated very efficiently too. So if you are looking for somewhere to sign up to, the place that most of the pros choose to play, will not disappoint.
Register now and play instantly.
Pokerstars.com review
At pokerstars.com a 100% new player cash match deposit bonus is available when you sign up to join the site.
There is a poker room that all players at the site can enter were 7 different poker games are available, these games are -
Texas hold em, , omaha high, omaha hi lo poker, seven card stud hi lo poker, razz, horse, five card draw and 2-7 triple draw.
Aswell as playing all of the games listed above at poker stars you can also enter the online poker rank tournaments, alot of different tournaments can be entered into which all have different time . There are also many different promotions on at the moment including ways of adding money to the balance in your www.pokerstars.com account.
Some of these promos are pokerstars sunday million were a guaranteed £1,000,000 can be won and pokerstars sunday warm up were a guaranteed £500,000 can be won.
As soon as you make your very first deposit you will become a VIP at pokerstars, as you play you will also earn points that will determine your VIP club level, the higher level you are on will get you more points as you play poker.
When you become a VIP at pokerstarsyou will also be rewarded with cash bonuses and you can spend your points on different things such as electronic items.
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partypoker.co Omaha Hi/Lo Strategy
The main thing to remember in Omaha hi/lo at partypoker.co is what sort of hole cards open doors for you in terms of making hands once the board cards fall.
I have been sat many times at an Omaha hi/lo online game at sites such as partypoker.co.uk and am pretty surprised at how excited players seem to get if they are dealt a pair of Jacks or Queens in their hand.
This isn’t Holdem at partypoker.uk guys, how often is the hand that takes the high half of the pot going to be a pair of Queens or Jacks? Not often at all.
You can attach some strength to a fairly high pair such as these but you must always be looking at what else you will be aiming for other than making your unlikely set. Double suited cards for instance will make your hand a bit stronger in online poker, but beware if you don’t have the nut flush, because someone else often does.
Part of the reason for this of course is that Aces are important in hi/lo, a pair of aces are pretty strong at www.partypoker.co.uk, but it is nice to have a 2 or 3 to go with them.
If you have an Ace and a two in your hand for instance gives the best chance at making the nut low hand, if any combination of 3 cards below a 9 come down you will have the nut low as long as you do not pair your Ace or deuce.
When it comes to making the best possible low hand with online poker rank, I have also seen many players with no high hand raise as much as they possibly can when there are another 3 or 4 players in the pot. Obviously the one player with a strong high hand calls the nut low player down and they end up basically splitting each others money between them.
I personally, cannot see the sense in this when you could keep your raises smaller and perhaps end up splitting 3 or 4 players money, instead of forcing the other players out.
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Pokeroom.com review
Pokeroom.com is widely known as one of the more established online poker sites, having been around for some years now.
As a result of this I feel, they have developed pokeroom well and smoothed out most of the problems there may have been in the early days.
Pokerroom.com offers the usual vast array of gauranteed tournaments and freerolls and many other games for players to be quickly seated and playing in.
They also offer a larger variety of games than many sites which is nice to see. The look and feel of www.pokeroom.com is also very attractive, with the many avatars and clarity of graphics really giving a professional look about the site.
The lobby functions well and shouldn’t give a new player too many navigation problems either. There are other small bonuses and plus points with Pokeroom.com that could easily slip under the radar too, it has an ongoing relationship with gaming commissions to ensure fairness and impartial play to the customer, also no download is necessary to play onsite.
The standard bonus offer for first time deposits on Pokerroom is quite low at 20%, although bonus codes can increase this to 40%. This I feel is one area that could be improved, and another small negative point is that U.S players are not allowed affecting the online poker rank, but this of course cannot be helped by the site.
The good points on www.pokeroom.com are numerous, they have excellent standards of online support, with live chat available if the troubleshooting sections do not provide the answers you need.
Also due to Pokerroom being a good quality site, and a well established one, the are lots of players onsite and so finding a game you like the look of should be easy enough.
CLICK HERE to open your account at www.pokeroom.com
Reads in Online 5 Card Draw
This particular variant of poker is one which I have had some success with online in recent days. There is a simple combination of things to take into account when considering a players strength, firstly, and most importantly, the amount of cards they choose to draw. This narrows possible hands down significantly when making a read. If your opponent swaps four or five cards obviously they have nothing pre draw. If they swap 3 they almost certainly have a pair, they swap 2 and they almost certainly have either a set or a pair with a high kicker, and 1 means they very likely have either two pair or a big draw. These assumptions are not infallible but they are correct over 90% of the time by my reckoning. We can narrow this further by considering their actions preflop. If a player swaps two for example, if they have been keen to raise and re raise preflop, a 3 of a kind is the most likely hand you are facing. If they limp in then most often they are keeping a pair and a big kicker. When an opponent swaps one card and you are first to act afterwards, you have only one real clue as to whether they have a big draw or two pair. If the player did not raise preflop, suspect a big draw, you would expect a preflop raise if they had two pair. Raise fairly small if you have at least a high or middle pair and you think your opponent is on a big draw. There is more chance they missed it than hit it, so you can often win the pot uncontested. If they re raise they probably made the hand, if they fold, they missed it, and if they flat call, it is possible they missed but made a pair. This is the reason why I wouldn’t raise unless I had a reasonable pair myself. Certainly in the smaller limit games in which I play, bearing all the above points in mind should help you become a better reader of opponents cards in no time.