Celtic Poker Tour: Quick update

Here's a full report of this event, which is part of my almost-live blog. A warning, it's long. I'm posting it because I hate the fact these wasters are scamming people who dont know any better.

"I live in Dublin, which is the ideal scenario for an amatuer Irish poker player. Currently there are three casinos running regular poker tournaments, with rumours that Dermot Desmond is soon to open a "super" casino. I can pick and choose my tournaments, and play in the ones that offer the most value. But outside Dublin, the situation isn't so good. With the exception of Cork and Belfast, finding decently-run tournaments is a difficult task. So what you now have are a lot of people setting up their own "Poker Tours" around the country, jumping on the poker bandwagon. PokerEvents was the first of these, and this has proved to be a big success in it's first year; it must said that it is bringing some very-well run tournaments to parts of the country which aren't as lucky as Dublin.

With this in mind, it was with great interest that I heard that the Celtic Poker Tour was rolling into Mullingar, where I'm originally from. I was home that night as I had a wedding on the following day, so I decided to see if they knew what they were at, or if they were just out to screw the masses of Mullingar. And initially I was quite impressed. Registration was quick, with four staff dedicated to the job, so the 250 odd players were sorted out with little fuss. Their set-up looked to be good, with proper poker tables (all be it round, rather than the regular casino type) packed into the area, and two projector screens at each corner of the main room to display the tournament clock, blinds, etc. The chips and cards were of good quality, although I soon noticed that there were no cutting cards. And there were a lot of staff around... so far so good.

The tournament itself was a standard NLHE rebuy event, with your inital stack of 5000 costing 50euro (+ 5 for reg), and the option of 3 rebuys and a top-up or 4 rebuys, at 25euro each. Rebuys lasted for the first 6 levels (20minutes each), with the standard structure of 25/50, 50/100, 75/150, etc, and the freezeout period would have levels of 15 minutes each. Antes were to be introduced at level 14.

One reason that I wanted to play this game was that I was interested in seeing what the standard of play was like in the midlands. But when play started it became apparent that most of the players had little or no holdem experience. I would guess that there were two above-average players at each table, and the rest were practically newbies. I heard the usual comments that always make me laugh at these events, such as "any two cards can win", "Do you see yer man Gus Hansen on the telly, he plays with sh!te and still wins", etc.

The play itself was very passive, with little or no raising at all pre-flop. A couple of guys limped with KK, and proceeded to lose all their money on dangerous boards. Seeing how passive things were, I started to limp into a lot of pots in late position, getting to see cheap flops. On one such occasion, my 74s turned into a house by the river, and I doubled up when another guy hit his straight. (He actually hit the straight on the turn, but checked it into me... I was fairly sure he was on the straight draw when he called my flop bet, so there was no way I was betting. His slow-play cost him!) Next hand I semi-bluff an all-heart flop holding the Ace of hearts, and take down a big pot, folding out JJ. And then in the very next hand I pick up KK, which I raise and get one caller. Flop comes Ten-high, it's checked to me, and I make a pot-sized bet. Villain moves all-in and I call. He was "trapping" with AT, and I pick up another big pot when my Kings hold up... in the space of three hands I'm up to 30K! And I still have a top-up of 10K to come.

So far, the organisation still seemed to be ok, except that the way tables were being balanced was starting to niggle at me. Niggling me in that I dont know how they were doing it, and I dont think they knew either! As it transpired, any illusions I had that these guys knew what they were doing was shattered after the break. Blind levels were down to 15mins, so with a self-deal structure it was already rare enough to get a full round of the table in a given level. But the farcical efforts at table-balancing reduced the amount of hands to a trickle. The general method was to let a table get reduced down to 6 players, and then a member of staff would go looking for players. I think they were getting players by breaking down tables, but it could have been any random method. Whatever way they were doing it, it meant that play would grind to a halt, with the clock still running. In one level we lost a full 7 minutes! What a f**king joke! And to top it off, when the tables were full again a card was dealt to each player, and the first Ace became the button. Another issue I saw was that they didn't do any chip races, probably because they dont know how to do these either. This added more delays as a member of staff would come around changing chip denominations in the middle of a hand, again causing everyone to stop playing. And yet another problem was that with the amount of players going all-in, there were side-pots galore to be worked out. I was happy enough to do this at my table, but I'm sure there were plenty of tables where nobody had a clue what was going on. This comical situation meant that there were maybe 4 or 5 hands dealt in a given level, IF you were lucky.

So for my remaining time in the tournament, I was gradually getting on edge (read this as I was f**king pissed off as hell!). Which was a pity, because early in the freezeout period I get my stack up to 60K when I pick up AA in the SB, and call an all-in against a hasty KT steal. So with blinds at 300/600, I'm in excellent shape, and there are no Andy Black's or Scott Gray's in this field! But with just 20 hands at most per hour, the structure got too tight too quick, and my stack got worked down to 30K (although admittedly I was guilty of not being aggressive enough with a decent stack). The level where we had to wait 7 minutes for players tilted me, and I got knocked out on a coin-flip. It's a long time since I went on tilt in any game, but it took just a couple of hours in this crappy tournament to do it!

Another contentious issue, for me at least, was the prize pool. For a field of 250 players, only the top 9 were to be paid, with the payout capped at 10K, with 5K going to the winner. (As it happened, there were a couple of extra places paid on the night; how generous of them to give out an extra few hundred euro!). Capped prize pools are one of the dirtiest words in tournament poker, and with the average spend at 100 euro per person, these chancers were taking a serious cut out of the players money. Obviously, staff have to be paid, and the organisers are in the game to show a profit, but this skimming of the prize pool is a massive scam. There is absolutely no value in this game for any player. Fighting your way through 250 players to win just 5 grand is a disgrace; Had I won this, I'd be going looking for the other 4 or 5K that I would be entitled to in a 250 player tournament.

This is a quote from an email I got from these guys: "Our aim at Celtic Poker Tour is to revolutionise the way poker tournaments are run in Ireland, and, as avid players, we understand the elements that create the perfect 'Hold'Em' experience." I'm not sure what they think they understand, but they have no idea how to run NLHE tournaments. They cant balance tables, cant do chip races, dont provide dealers, and to top it off, they scam the punter out of the prize money. If this is the revolution, I dont want any part of it. Avoid these tournaments like the plague. Dont give these f**cking chancers your money."

corblimey wrote:

Not to be a thickie, but what were the staff doing if they weren't dealing?

At the start, they gave out the chips and cards. After that, they were "balancing" tables, sorting out side-pot issues (I think), and... not sure after that. There were about 10 extra staff in all, along with the two main guys.

Whatever about the prize pool issue, the fact that they cant do simple things like balancing tables or chip races is a big problem. It's just badly run, end of story, but these are things that can be improved. My report may have been a bit harsh, but it's just not a good tournament.

Doesn't really matter to me in the long run, I always have the Fitz.

lafortezza wrote:

Anyone have contact details for Celtic Poker Tour. They should be emailed the Url to this thread so they can defend themselves/set the record straight.

lafortezza, did you send these guys this link? I'm curious to know why they haven't replied yet.

"patmac&quot wrote:

Hi
Looks like two tournaments on the same night (Thursday 22nd) in Athlone you wait all year for one and 2 come along at the same time. Judging from comments the pokerevents looks a better bet as the Celtic Poker is heavily advertised posters in all the pubs signs on the road etc. Any suggestions as I've never played in of these tournaments before.

Go to Pokerevents, much better run and much better value.