Victoria Coren on Poker Bluffing

25 Aug 2010

In her latest article for the Guardian newspaper, their poker correspondent and acclaimed poker author Victoria Coren has urged her poker playing readers to be cautious when it comes to bluffing.

Victoria points out the in order to be successful at bluffing it is necessary to have a full appreciation of such things as pot odds, to be able to read you opponents like a newspaper, and to fully understand what it is you are doing, particularly in terms of the hand that you are attempting to convince your opponents that you hold.

She illustrates this with a hand that was played at the GUKPT Luton leg a little over a week ago. Victoria holding A-H; 5-H was on the button and called a player who had raised 600. The two blinds also called.

The flop showed A-C; 4-D; A-D and the two who had called previously checked. The person who had raised originally raised again, this time to 1,000. Victoria checked as her 4-D meant that raising would have been unwise. One of the blinds called and the other folded.

The turn delivered 6-C which was checked by everybody and the river delivered 3-H. The remaining blind bet 2,500 and the player who had until then been dictating events checked.

In her mind, play suggested that the raiser had an ace with a bigger kicker than her 5 and that in all likelihood the remaining blind had a full house. Feeling that there was no chance that she held the strongest hand she folded.

The action man showed and Ace and a Jack but the blind raiser had nothing – just a flush draw. He had been bluffing and had been doing it very badly. What he had done was to fail to take account of the hands that his opponents had been likely to hold. It was apparent that at least one of them held a very strong hand and that they would call him. He had simply attempted to deceive his opponents into believing that he held a strong hand, and even then he failed to go all the way on his bluff by calling only half the pot.

Victoria’s advice is “When in doubt, don't bluff at all.”