The third leg of the Irish Tour, The Southern Open took place at the Macau
in Cork over the weekend. The organisers have adjusted the structure slightly
from the previous legs to allow the tournaments to run over two days.
The guys who run the tour were pretty sure that they would 'not' reach
the €30,000 guarantee in the run up to the €300 buy in event. A number of other
games were on the weekend and the host venue didn't have much time to fill
satellites with this event coming right on the tail of the Irish Classic.
In fairness to the Irish Tour they could easily of pulled the guarantee or
even the tournament, but they decided they would take the hit and run with it.
This looked like a very costly decision early on as only 25 players were seated
at the start of the tournament, which would of meant a €24,000 overlay.
At this stage the powers of social media kicked into full swing. Twitter and
Facebook became awash with the news of a massive overlay. By the time the 6
levels of late registration closed the field had increased to a respectable 93
players and the overlay was reduced to €5,000.
My starting table was packed with good players. Chris Dowling, Tim Farrelly,
Ken Ralph, Tony Collins, Jamie 'brutal' Flynn. You get the idea, no easy
chips. I slugged away all day and every time I looked like getting a stack
to play with I'd hit a reversal.
I don't think I'm one to complain about how I'm running but one instant
well into the day brought home to me where my mindset is currently at. I had needlessly
slow played aces as I got all my chips in on the turn against kings. As the
dealer counted out the pot, Chris Dowling asked me do you have the aces because
the look on you face says you have the kings.
I'm sitting there 95% favorite to win the showdown and instead of fist pumping in my head, I'm fully
expecting to be sent packing, This really is not a good place to be as a poker
player.
Into level 12, I lost half my stack to Kieran 'the croc' Walsh in a QQ v 1010 cooler. Then
another few chips when I decided not to call off with a flush draw while having odds
to do so if the draw was live. A few people said I should of called here but
I'm happy enough my decision not to.
My exit came shortly after with three tables remaining in the tournament. Gary Clarke raised UTG the
SB made it 10k, I shoved from the BB with QQ for 38k. Gary folded and the SB
called with Jacks and hit one on the flop. Pity as it was an above average pot and I'd have
fancied a deep run if I could of held.
I felt very rusty in the Irish Classic two weeks ago. I wasn't making
glaring mistakes but just wasn't plugged in and on the drive home a couple of
hand stuck in my head where I definitely gave up too easily and missed
spots. I guess you can't just expect to turn up once every
four weeks and be on your A-game. Time to get the finger out and put in a bit
of volume for the rest of the year.
