Matthew Carter won a PokerPlayer freeroll to play in the World Series of Poker Europe, this is his story
The nerves are jangling as I start at Fifty on day 1B, on a table with John Duthie and Michael Greco, but they soon settle as the first couple of hours see my chipstack increase as pocket Queens come my way and a couple of A-J’s hit the flop hard.
My hand of the day, if not the tournament, comes in session two as my pocket Jacks make quads on a J-K-J flop. I don’t make the most of it as I’m trying to trap Greco and he’s doing likewise with pocket aces.
In the final session of the day I knock out Peter Gould with K-K vs 10-10, he hits a Ten on the flop but the turn gives me a flush draw and the King on the river makes me a bigger set. The last hour sees me sitting next to double world champion Johnny Chan and the day ends with me on 40K. If it gets any better than that I’d like to know how, and I soon find out.
Day 2B and my table draw puts me alongside Roland De Wolfe on an outside table, but it’s broken within half an hour and I move inside the poker room on a table with Tony G and Isabelle Mercier among others. It takes me a while to get going but when I fold AK face up to a raise from EPT winner Mats Gavatin, I get a “wow” from him, an “Oh My” from Isabelle and “That’s a strong fold” from Tony G. After that pots are easier to come by. Late in the evening I get moved upstairs where I manage to double through with pocket Kings against Jimmy Fricke’s A-K and finish the day on 58K.
Day 3 and I can’t believe my luck. I’m drawn next to Daniel Negreanu on a table with Gus Hansen and Patrik Antonius, and for some reason the powers that be decide this will be the feature table. I’m playing in the World Series! On telly! Against my 2 favourite players (Gus and Daniel)!
I manage to pick up a couple of pots against Gus but at the end of the first session my stack hasn’t moved and I’m fairly short-stacked. A change of shirt at the break (I’m now wearing the PokerPlayer livery) and straight away I am dealt AK.
Patrick raises to 27K (half my stack) so I push all in. Everyone folds to Patrick who calls me with 88. I catch the flop of A-10-3 and with the turn another 10 Patrick has 2 cards in the deck to beat me. Unfortunately the river brings an 8 and I’m out in 63rd place.
It was the most fantastic week I could possibly have imagined, lasting two days longer than I had hoped for, and by my reckoning playing with the holders of 14 World Series bracelets, including 2 main events, 8 WPT, 3 EPT and 2 Aussie Millions winners. Thanks to Poker Player and GNUF for an amazing adventure.
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