World Cup South Africa 2010

‘The beautiful game’ as Pele called football (soccer if you are a US person brought up to believe handling a ball constantly is ‘football’, and not ‘handball’…), about to go ballistic in a major festival of the game which for a long time will mean wall-2-wall football. This will be like a drunk being let loose into a liquor store.

Partners who do not like the game will fume and get bitter, politicians will jump on any bandwagon going especially if their country is doing well and UK publicans will pray that the English team will single handling resuscitate the brewing industry by getting to the final and possibly winning it!

Can I make one prediction at this point – if England win the World Cup then England will be the place to be. It could revive the economics of this nation. It has been proved by numerous study that a nation doing well in some form of sporting endeavour has a knock on effect on the economics of the country involved. That is why the former Eastern Bloc countries spent so much time and energy on sporting achievements.

I think it was George Orwell that said ‘sport was war by another name…’, and Nelson Mandela certainly used sport (1995 Rugby World Cup) to help consolidate the relatively peaceful transfer of South Africa from apartheid to democracy. It is very unlikely that South Africa can do this again as the skill level between South Africa and say Brazil or Spain is far to great for something like this.

Which brings me onto poker. The World Series of Poker 2010 will be taking a major back seat as nothing can beat the religion that is football. As Liverpool legendary manager Bill Shankly once said football was more important than life and death. Like poker football manages to be more than a simple game. It represents a philosophy – just like poker.

Football is about community and kindred spirit in a common goal. Poker is naked capitalism and capitalism as practice by an individual who has nothing more than the knowledge of the cards he or she has. Football is about teamwork and although an individual can alter a game it is on the whole about a team mastering another team. Poker deals with wealth accumulation – yes there can be collusion but this is seen as cheating.

I have always been fascinated by the fact that a large number of US Presidents have been pretty good poker players – apparently. This maybe folklore to encapsulate the nature of US culture, but, it does make sense as the US of A was always seen to be the bulwark of Western 20th Century capitalism. In fact President Nixon was supposed to have financed his first political campaign for office via the winnings he made playing poker. It was not only because of Watergate was he called ‘Tricky Dicky’.

In both of these pursuits there are other similarities in the sense that both have very simple rules. Therefore everyone can learn to play. The difficulty comes in learning to win and win consistently. Undoubtedly there will be an element of luck, but, luck overtime does even its self out. The skill in poker is not to make mistakes and give away your chips. Just as in poker you do seem to see the same names at the top on the various trophy and league tables.

The big difference is that poker encourages mis-information. Poker demands that you tell lies and make your opponent believe you have a bad hand when you have a good hand, or, that you have a good hand when you have a bad hand. In football you cannot say that Didier Drogba is injured then bring him out next day fresh as a daisy, there would be enquiry etc. However, you can use mind games to get an advantage as practice by Alex Ferguson or Jose Morinho. These guys will say things which can un-nerve opposing teams or motivate their own teams to win games, a very subtle art.

So that makes the difference between the two games which are very similar and the way online poker firms have been pushing any form of linkage between the World Cup and poker it has captured the mind and soul of the world and I for one will be loving the month of June.

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Antoine Saout

The big event on Saturday is set to start 12 noon (Pacific Time) and I have been given a surprise tip by Magical Tipser – it is Antoine Saout.

He is the 25 year old Frenchman who is the surprise package in this years final and subsequently he is a big price (18/1 on Betfair). As the rank outsider he is expected to be one of the first to be knocked out, however, do not be surprised if he stays in a lot longer than most people think.

Apparently he has been practicing very hard by playing in all sorts of tournaments and seems to have a lot of stamina which is needed for such competition.

James Akenhead – come into the calculations as another big price (15/1) but he is also short stacked and he too will need a miracle, but sometimes miracles do happen.

This Easter weekend marks the start of the serious betting season, with the summer games taking over from the winter games. The winter games (mainly football or soccer for our US/Canadian friends) coming to a conclusion and the bookmakers are gearing up for the bonanza of the flat season. Just a little tip with the credit crunch/recession/depression – really make the bookies work for your money. They will be loads of special deals and offers abound so take advantage of them.

Also its beginning of all sorts of dreams for the holy grail of the World series of Poker and the chance for many obscure poker players attempt to make a name for themselves to have a go at the big one and become a sensation such as Peter Eastgate – last years sensation. The fact that Eastmann made his way through the online route to reach the pinnacle of the poker world is the dream of all online poker players and that includes me.

You know the odds are prohibitive and the hours of work will be stressful but what is the point of playing poker if not to aim for the big prize? Straight away you can imagine the guffaws from those online sharks that make a living playing 8 – 12 screens at once and nicking a £1 from each one every 20 minutes or so.
But for us romantics and frankly mug online players it’s a form of relaxation in a video game sense, as well as a way to earn a crust when we have a chance.

Obviously I have to try and get to the table of gold because I feel that I can hold my own with the best of the best. My only faults are a) I am too reckless, b) too impatient and c) I am too wasteful. But you never know I do have my moments and I can still dream.

Talking about dreams it has been amusing seeing how the bookies have reacted to last week Grand National in which they are complaining that the 100/1 big outsider Mon Mome was not a major benefit for them because in total they only made £30 million and not the £210 million as been reported! We punters must try harder to lose more money to the bookies to make sure that their share prices remain buoyant and the bookmakers keep the lifestyle they have become used too! Somehow I think the bookies ‘..doth protest too much…’

Anyway since I will probably fall at the final hurdle of making it too the final of the WSOP (not from the lack of trying I should add), I will take solace in the new innovations that I maybe involved in for the online poker scene (which it surely needs badly) and of course the pleasure of discovering more ’Poker Totty’. Which in my view is the greatest piece of blogging endeavour  every undertaken by a poker playing reprobate and degenerate – and there ain’t many of them about is there?