Tournament Strategies
After receiving pocket cards, you are immediately faced with a choice: play your cards and either raise or call the blinds, or fold.
Practice Matters
Never overestimate a Poker cheat. Don't expect him to work
Never overestimate a Poker cheat. Don't expect him to work miracles. Just expect him to win the money. If luck favors him, he may not have to make a crooked move all night, or he may make only one crooked move in the whole card session. But that one move always comes at just the right time to get the money. In most games the move can even be executed clumsily and get by; the average player almost never spots it because he seldom suspects the people with whom he plays, and because, even if he did suspect them, he lacks the necessary knowledge to know what to look for and wouldn't recognize it if he did happen to be looking in the right place at the right time.
Believe it or not, most sharpers are poor card players on the square
Believe it or not, most sharpers are poor card players on the square (playing honestly). A good card mechanic spends so much of his time practicing cheating moves and concentrating in play on watching for the right opportunity to use his skill that he seldom develops a good sense of card strategy.