Shevliakov’s AKs on the EPT Monte Carlo FT
Interesting hand on the EPT Monte Carlo final table. I can’t seem to link a timestamp to an ongoing livestream from home so I will transcribe it and find a link later.
Hand starts 6-handed. 60k/120k/120k.
Wakil opens LJ to 270k with QJs (3.5M). Shevliakov appears to look towards this raise on the live footage, as he retraces the action ahead of him that he missed.
It folds to Shevliakov in the SB, who then checks his cards and peels AKs. He announces his raise to 360k (7.7M) apparently his standard SB open sizing, and places the chips out.
The commentators and dealer recognise this as an invalid action, and the floor is called over to make a ruling. The floor forces Shevliakov to make a minimum 3bet to 420K, and action folds back round to Wakil.
Wakil takes the valid opinion that Shevliakov will be super wide as he seems to behave considered his opportunity as an SB RFI one. He tank 4bet jams his stack, covered by Shevliakov, who calls and wins on the runout. Wakil is eliminated in 6th for €199k.
There is speculation that is was an angle shoot from Shevliakov. Allegedly, he had not announced a raise size before this one.
Curious on the community’s thoughts.
***
Edit/MH:
Didn't really pay attention to the other stacks, but just calling with QJs IP is fine there, they raised UTG and are protected on a lot of boards, not like the SB can just start blasting every texture. 4betting to 1 million was the correct "aggressive" play if you assume that SB is angling some % of the time. You're completely torched with QJs if SB takes the angle with actual top of range QQ+ so shove is a bit of a punt.
Wakil took the worst line given his situation, unlucky.
Just rewatched it. Good lord, Shevliakov is chilling there drinking his tea (takes like 5 sips right after each other) as the floor comes over, Wakil should have read the situation better lol. People will still continue not believing in "live reads" though.
The commentators heard from Angelov that he did it to a friend of his around last 20 as well
Disgusting. Just look at his face when he's about to shake hand with Wakil, clear scumbag
A fool and his money soon departed
While I don’t approve of angle shooters, I do get amused when someone falls prey as they try and seize on a mistake on action or misclick of chip amounts
There’s no need to potentially reward someone with your stack. You have QJs in position, just call. And if he was angle shooting, it benefits you.
I like how the other guy tried to benefit from the "mistake" and then almost cried when his steal went wrong and he lost the hand.
Difficult to say if this was really an angleshoot or not. It's not like he was putting himself in a very comfortable position minraising Aks there and giving his opponent odds to call with any 2 in Position.
Getting mad at someone for angling when you tried to take advantage of what you think is a innocent mistake at the time is pretty comical.
Always find this kind of situations so weird. People are bringing out their pitch forks because he did what? Pretended to have a weaker range than he did in practice? That is literally the absolute worst thing he could have done if you choose to interpret what he did with the worst possible intent. That is literally what people will try to do all the time, make opponent think you have a weaker holding than you do.
Is limping UTG an angle as well if you do it in a nonchalant manner as if you are just limping in with some crap and want to see the flop, but you have AA?
No one forced him to 4b jam, but he did because he wanted to take advantage of what he thought was a mistake and get SBs raising chips without contest.
There was a GTO Lab recently with Kornuth and he mentioned doing this exact same angle shoot on occasion because he feels you must have balance for those times you accidentally misclick, other wise you may open yourself to getting 4bet shoved on with QJs exploitively. And that this play he did on Negreanu and it worked exactly as planned.
And yeah being so eager to 4bet shove 30bbs here with all the ICM considerations seems a bit optimistic. If your opponent is ever angling, you’re shoving into a nutted range. And is shoving for a few BB really worth it when the profitability is likely nearly as high flatting at an incredible price in position.
So let me see if I understand this correctly… guy with QJ thinks guy with AK made a mistake so he tries to punish him by going all in?
So the AK guy isn’t allowed to take advantage of other players at the table but the JQ guy is ? Stop the crying JQ guy … if you wanted to play “fair” you should have just called , what a bunch of crap lol
So let me see if I understand this correctly… guy with QJ thinks guy with AK made a mistake so he tries to punish him by going all in?
So the AK guy isn’t allowed to take advantage of other players at the table but the JQ guy is ? Stop the crying JQ guy … if you wanted to play “fair” you should have just called , what a bunch of crap lol
The difference between the two (if it was an angleshoot, which I think it was), is in Shevliakov pretending to make a mistake. That's the scummy part. Wakil didn't pretend to do anything.
Still, this is no Freitez-level angleshoot, , and as other have pointed out, it is pretty easily parried by just calling.
Maybe I was a bit too harsh but he really didn't look innocent and also that one guy said that he had done it before. This time he had 30~ bbs but what if he had 15? A completely different situation. Anyways, what do you guys think about dealers taking notes whenever someone makes a mistake and floor is called? And then letting everyone know when the FT starts if something has happened. Explaining the mistake and maybe even telling them which hand they had. I don't think this is too offensive for the players and had Wakil known this, it would most likely have been another situation. Thoughts?
Statement from Wakil:
Full Text without Leaving 2p2 Below
Spoiler
I’ve been receiving a lot of messages about the situation with Aleksandr Shevliakov, leading to my 6th place finish in the EPT Monte Carlo Main Event yesterday, so I’ve made some comments below to address it. The reason for this post is strictly because I believe that it is important to protect the game that we all love, and to point out the players who may willingly attempt to compromise the integrity of the incredible game of poker.
To start, I want to commend the commentary team of @J_Hartigan
@Stapes
@GriffinBenger
for handling the situation at the table with clarity and professionalism, keeping the focus on the gameplay while responsibly addressing what occurred.
Early in the stream, this player repeatedly declined to place both of his cards in the RFID card reader box unless the hand went to a flop. Despite multiple polite requests from the dealer, this continued. I raised the issue because the rest of the table was being asked to reveal both cards, and he was the only one not doing so. Another player also joined in, and the floor was called. Aleksandr stated his reasoning was concern over delayed stream information being shared from the rail - a somewhat fair concern - but nonetheless, consistency in rule enforcement matters. After some back and forth, the floor ended up making a new ruling at the time, that phones were no longer allowed on the rail for the FT.
Moving on to the bust out hand - I am extremely confident that this was an angle that was done deliberately by this player. Prior to this taking place, the respect that I had for Aleksandr made me truly believe that he would not pull a move like this on such a big/prestigious stage, with hundreds of thousands of viewers, knowing that the entire FT is being recorded and that it would be extremely easy to look back at the stream and see exactly where he was looking, having no way of lying about not seeing me act. Unfortunately, I have since learned that just because I hold myself to the highest of ethical and moral standards, and have tremendous respect for my opponents and for the game of poker, does not necessarily mean that everyone else feels or acts the same way.
Aside from the very clear photo below where he can be seen staring directly at me as I am waiting to act, here are the three primary reasons (in no particular order) that I believe this was a deliberate angle:
1) I used up almost my entire shot clock (~15 seconds) before opening, and verbally announcing my raise and size. The dealer then also verbally announced my raise and size prior to the action coming to him.
2) This was the first time at this FT (of 6) where he verbally announced any raise or bet size in any hand that he was involved in.
3) As soon as the all in was taking place, Boris Angelov called him out for “fake misclicking” and then let us know that he did the exact same thing to his friend with 20 players left in this same event.
Oftentimes, if something like this is an honest mistake, you will see a person looking down on their phone and genuinely not paying attention. This has happened to most people at some point playing live poker. However, as we are not allowed electronic devices at the FT, he had no other distractions in sight, outside of the waitress who brought him his drink prior to the hand beginning, but she was out of the picture at this point.
For those who will say, “but you tried to take advantage of his mistake”: as @GriffinBenger
said on the stream, the hand completely changes when this happens and the options come down to which strategic route I want to take, without being deceptive or trying to trick my opponent. There is a very big difference between adapting to an opponent’s mistake, and actively creating confusion to gain an edge while hiding your intent.
With all of this being said, I take full accountability for believing that he was not angling and for my decision to go all in. If I thought that the probability of him deliberately angling was higher, I most likely would’ve chosen to continue in this hand by calling. At the end of the day, what he did is within the rules of the game, and while most people, including myself, view this as an unethical act to gain an unfair advantage, he did not do something that is outside of the current set of rules and it can be fairly argued that he outsmarted me in this situation. Regardless, if he was willing to stop play to demand stricter fairness around phones on the rail, then he should be held to that same standard when it comes to protecting the integrity of the game itself.
Despite the situation that took place, I’d still like to congratulate Aleksandr on his victory, and to the rest of the players for a great final table performance. Sincere thanks to all of the hardworking @PokerStarsLIVE
staff for running a world-class event as always, and for @PokerNews
on their coverage of the event. Looking forward to being back next year and going for an even deeper run. - JW
Getting mad at someone for angling when you tried to take advantage of what you think is a innocent mistake at the time is pretty comical.
This take is so silly, what is he supposed to do? Take a line he think likely is lower ev to just be kind to another pro that presumably made a mistake by accident? It would straight up be soft playing if u dont go with what u think is the highest ev. Didn't watch the hand myself but doubt it matters since people claim he obv looked at the raise There has also been plenty of similair situations where well known reputable pros have done the same thing.
The stream said it was the first time during the featured table that Shevliakov announced the word "raise". Apparently every other time he had raised, he just raised without articulating same. (as mentioned in Wakil's post.)
Yikes.
This take is so silly, what is he supposed to do? Take a line he think likely is lower ev to just be kind to another pro that presumably made a mistake by accident? It would straight up be soft playing if u dont go with what u think is the highest ev. Didn't watch the hand myself but doubt it matters since people claim he obv looked at the raise There has also been plenty of si
He was talking about his reaction and not his in-game action. And he is right and something also tells me that if the mad guy would have won the hand his reaction would have been a lot different.
But u didn't even bother to see the hand so I'm not sure why u would argue about it.
The difference between the two (if it was an angleshoot, which I think it was), is in Shevliakov pretending to make a mistake. That's the scummy part. Wakil didn't pretend to do anything.
Still, this is no Freitez-level angleshoot, , and as other have pointed out, it is pretty easily parried by just calling.
QJs thought it was an honest mistake and tried to take advantage of it. So he's being scummy right there.
Once you're scummy yourself you kinda lose the right to cry about the angle shot.
And of course he wasn't even against aces he was still super live.
QJs thought it was an honest mistake and tried to take advantage of it. So he's being scummy right there.
Once you're scummy yourself you kinda lose the right to cry about the angle shot.
And of course he wasn't even against aces he was still super live.
Scummy I think is too strong of a word as it’s an awkward situation. If he just calls then he has to worry about being capped. Is he supposed to give a speech to the effect of being a nice guy and just calling but don’t think he can’t have top of range because he can?
I’ve moved more to side that he was just a little bit of a sucker.
But he acknowledged that in his essay tweet
I like Kornuth's view. If people are going to show 0 sportsmanship and punish me if I ever misclick, theres nothing wrong with making a fake misclick now and then to keep them guessing.
Very funny that the guy while claiming he has the highest ethical and moral standards, is basically admitting that he was happily using his phone to get hand histories relayed from his rail, which is why the other guy wanted phones banned from the FT. Which was granted as its clearly unethical to have a team of people analyzing your opponents opening ranges from the rail.
Very funny that the guy while claiming he has the highest ethical and moral standards, is basically admitting that he was happily using his phone to get hand histories relayed from his rail, which is why the other guy wanted phones banned from the FT. Which was granted as its clearly unethical to have a team of people analyzing your opponents opening ranges from the rail.
Thought that was always kosher
It was just this past wsop final table where it got taken to next level because you could actually see the sausage being made
Thought that was always kosher
It was just this past wsop final table where it got taken to next level because you could actually see the sausage being made
The difference is that in the past you just had people saying "oh hes kinda tight he folded AQo to your UTG open once" whereas now the cheaters on the rail will be using the info from folded cards to construct a GTO range against you. Like "he folded AJo in that spot that means hes playing ~23% instead of the GTO 30% let me put that range into the solver and see how we should play against that". Way more unethical than pretending to not see an open.
The difference is that in the past you just had people saying "oh hes kinda tight he folded AQo to your UTG open once" whereas now the cheaters on the rail will be using the info from folded cards to construct a GTO range against you. Like "he folded AJo in that spot that means hes playing ~23% instead of the GTO 30% let me put that range into the solver and see how we should
I don’t think so, everyone can do it.
But I’m not outraged about either thing.
Everyone signed up for possibility of both.
Scummy I think is too strong of a word as it’s an awkward situation. If he just calls then he has to worry about being capped. Is he supposed to give a speech to the effect of being a nice guy and just calling but don’t think he can’t have top of range because he can?I’ve moved more to side that he was just a little bit of a sucker.But he acknowledged th
It is awkward. Even more so in a tournament than it would be in a cash game.
Maybe in a vacuum scummy is too strange of a word.
But trying to take advantage of what you think is a mistake, losing a 60/40 and then crying about it is rediculous.
He should at least be glad he didn't run into AA.
If he wants to make the argument he has a strategic reason to reraise that's fine but then don't cry when someone has a better hand.
He's not even really capped. People do trap with KK and AA sometimes.
It is awkward. Even more so in a tournament than it would be in a cash game.Maybe in a vacuum scummy is too strange of a word.But trying to take advantage of what you think is a mistake, losing a 60/40 and then crying about it is rediculous.He should at least be glad he didn't run into AA.If he wants to make the argument he has a strategic reason to reraise that's fine but then
Yeah I’m mostly on Team Shevliakov but I like how in other guy’s tweet he mentions that he may have gotten outplayed
