Sleeping Lizards and Form…

Joe 'The Elegance' Beevers, 13/10/2003

Poker Classics 2003, London
£1,500 No Limit Hold'em
Report by Joe on Monday, 13 October 2003 at 9:45 pm

As Barny said before, when he wrote about the hand that I clashed with Ross in during the Vic main event, form is a funny thing. There were a number of form horses this week at the Victoria Casino Poker Classics festival. A great week for The Mob as a whole with two outright victories and no less than nine money finishes. I tipped Ali Mallu to go close in the main event after he finished second to me in the £300 PLH and he was going very well until he became one of Mad Marty Wilson’s victims just before the final.

Another player who had an exceptional week was Tony ‘The Lizard’ Bloom. Those who know Tony will agree that he is a workaholic. Chief Executive of Premierbet.com he is never off the phone discussing football odds, injuries or results and he doesn’t get much time to play poker nowadays, which he plays as a hobby more than anything else. You will see this is probably a good thing for the rest of us. Those of you who don’t know Tony may remember him from the final of The Poker Million on Sky that Jimmy White won; he was the short guy sat on my left.

The first time Tony played a poker tournament after the Poker Million he won a £1000 NLH event at the Grosvenor Casino, Luton. This he followed in his next event, the £200 PLO Hi-Lo this week, with a back to back victory. It looked like a possible treble when he went to the final of the £500 Seven Card Stud the following day. Ram, however, had different ideas and knocked him out in 8th spot. Feeling a little tired Tony skipped playing the £750 NLH but made the final of the £500 PLO on Friday and then very weary decided that he would play the main event.

At the start I was drawn on Ross’s table and eventually I was moved to balance tables. I found myself sat on Surindar Sunar’s left and Tony was in the 8 seat on the opposite side of the table. After a couple of hours we were given a twenty minute break and unbeknownst to me Tony had decided to go and sit in his car for a quick 15 minute nap. After break we came back to the table and there was no sign of Tony. As the blinds moved around the table Tony’s blinds were automatically taken off his stack and posted, his cards were folded. I told Surindar that I was worried where he was and that I was going to phone him on his mobile. Surindar tried to persuade me otherwise. It turned out that Tony had fallen asleep and he was grateful for the wake up call.

When both Tony and I made the final yesterday I was all ready with the headline about how the sleeping Lizard knocked me out heads up but it wasn’t quite to be. I moved all in after Marty Wilson had limped and he called my raise. As he turned his hand over he sang, ‘don’t mess with my two two’s’, and turned over pocket deuces. My AQ proved worthless as he flopped a set and knocked me out in 8th place. It was Marty who also knocked Tony out in 4th when he got lucky with his Kc,10s versus As,Ks and he made a flush. Tony’s next tournament will be The Aussie Millions at Crown Casino, Melbourne in January 2004. What odds that he makes six final tables on the spin?

When we were two tables out both Marty and Ali Mallu were on the same table as Ram and I. They both seemed to want to raise and call raises with all sorts of strange holdings. Marty won big pots with J,4 o/s and K,2. Ali Knocked Ram out with pocket fours against Ram’s pocket sevens and then Marty knocked Ali out just before the final.

Marty tried to bulldoze his way through the field. He had a mountain of chips and proceeded to double up Jan Boubli calling a big raise with 2c,4c against Boubli’s pocket queens. I could see a very cool Marcel Luske adapting his game accordingly. He became less aggressive than usual and it was obvious that he had decided to wait for hands rather than opportunities. His patience was rewarded as Marty sent over a big pile of chips as Marcel found Aces and then again when Marcel flopped two queens against Marty’s two sevens. Marty was out soon after. Jan Boubli eventually finished second to The Flying (or singing) Dutchman.

For now we have a short break to catch up on sleep, e-mails and some media commitments. Next stop for the Mob on Tour is The Merrion Card Casino, Dublin, 23rd – 26th October. Join us then for more news, views, comment and stories.

Saturday, 11 October 7.30pm (Final Sunday 2.30pm)

£ 1,500 No Limit Holdem Freezeout

121 Entries / £ 181,500

1st Marcel Luske (Holland) £70,000
2nd Jan Boubli (France) £38,600
3rd Marty Wilson (England)£20,265
4th Tony Bloom (England) £12,545
5th Philippe Marmorstein (Germany) £7,720
6th Dave Welch (England) £5,790
7th Adam Lee £4,825
8th Joe ‘The Elegance’ Beevers (Hendon) £3,860
9th Ali Mallu £2,895
10th Simon Zach £2,000
11th Howard Plant (England) £1,750
12th Ram ‘CrazyHorse’ Vaswani (Hendon) £1,750
13th Thiery Mullin (France) £1,750
14th David Eastwood (England) £1,750
15th M Farooq £1,500
16th A Abraham (England) £1,500
17th Gary Arjamani £1,500
18th Xuyen Pham (England) £1,500

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