Select Language
3.9 Betting on the River
Now we have seen all the cards and should have a good indication of where we stand at this point and what cards our opponent may be holding.
How is our Opponent Acting?
As we’ve done all through the hand, the first thing we are going to do is look at betting patterns, to try and work out what our opponent is up to.
Someone playing a hand very weak suddenly comes to life on the river – Smells Fishy – sense a bluff
Someone playing a hand very aggressively gets timid after the river – sense a trap
Someone who has played both aggressively and tentatively in the hand – Sense insecurity – probably hold a medium strength hand
If a player bets after a River card that couldn’t have helped his hand – put him on a bluff.
I Hold the Nuts
Good position to be in, but the challenge now is to earn as much out of this winning hand as possible. You should value bet here, which means you should bet an amount which you think is just low enough for your opponent to call.
The only exception here is against an aggressive player or a player who bluffs a lot, in which case we can earn more money by check-raising (checking in the hope of inducing a bet from your opponent which you can then raise).
Don’t worry if your bet leads to your opponent folding, they may have called a smaller bet, but the chances are that there hand was not good enough to hold up and they would of folded to any bet, or if given the chance just checked to see a showdown.
Strong Hand
We’ll play all our strong hands in a similar fashion to the nuts by making a value bet in the hope that we get a call from our opponent.
Medium Strength Hand
The problem here is that even if we think there is a good chance we are in the lead, we cannot be confident of it.
The key here is not to bet when you are out of position. When you bet out of position with a medium strength hand, then you will only get called by a hand that beats you. Anybody holding a weaker hand than yours, will almost certainly fold to any bet.
The only way you can extract more money from a hand you are beating (which is pretty weak considering you are only holding a medium strength hand) is to check and try and induce a bluff from your opponent.
Weak Hand
If you have a hand that can only win with a bet that forces your opponent to fold then piece together the story and decide if a bluff is a good move to try and take the pot:
- Has your opponent showed any weakness in the hand – higher probability they will fold to our bluff.
- Was the River a likely scare card to your opponent
CONTINUE TO NEXT SECTION - 3.10
