Read Your Opponent

It is often said that you need a good poker face to win at Poker, implying that your face can be read but in fact it is the person as a whole that gives away the tells not just their face.


When it comes to reading your opponent the tells you are looking for aren't necessarily a body language tell at all but a way or pattern of betting.

One Poker Star claims to be able to "see through your soul." Which is clearly nonsense intended to make his opponents feel ill at ease and prone to give away nervous tells or make mistakes. Don't believe a word of it.

Top players whilst paying attention to your body language will focus on the way you play particular hands. Are you a Fish or a Maniac? A Fox or a Farmer?

If he is studying you he probably isn't waiting to see if your ears or eyelid twitches but is desperately trying to remember what kind of hand you had last time you played like this.

He will be wondering whether you are bluffing or not and how much you bet the last time you did.

He will be trying to remember whether you check to draw people into a hand or raise to protect a hand if for example you get a three of a kind on the flop
TV pundits will try to read far too much into peoples' expressions to make the game more interesting for their audience but trying to figure out what a top player like Daniel Negreanu is thinking behind some of his facial expressions is almost impossible.
Reading tells and people are two quite different skills. Reading tells is concerned more specifically with whether someone has a great hand or whether they are bluffing. Reading people is more about understanding how they behave and think generally so that we can judge what they are probably thinking from their behaviour.

To learn to read tells you must study your opponents' movements and gestures not just while you are in a hand but after you fold so that you can correlate their behaviour to the cards they hold.

Perhaps your opponent puts his hand over his mouth before placing a large bet. Does he only do this when the large bet is a bluff and not when the hand is strong?
Reading poker players is the key to winning big in poker.
Ultimately Poker is played against people and understanding the way players think and play will add a massive extra dimension to your game. If your opponents haven't mastered this aspect of their game you will have a huge advantage over them.

Imagine you are the great detective Sherlock Holmes analysing every detail about your opponent, their clothes - are they flamboyant and extrovert indicating boldness but perhaps rash behaviour or sombre indicating conservative and safe, calculated play. What kind of job do they have - an accountant or math teacher will probably calculate the odds all the time whereas a hairdresser will try to read people more. A lay preacher may not be a good bluffer unless they are already telling you fibs. A lawyer on the other hand is probably an accomplished bluffer.

For example a new player joins your table unkempt, fidgety and less than clean cut. His shirt is open and he's got plenty of gold round his neck.
Do you think he is more likely to play in a cautious, measured way, afraid to bluff or over-bet the pot or is he more likely to be a fearless and aggressive maniac.
If you're not sure or went for the shy retiring player you have some people watching to catch up on.

Developing a talent for reading tells in conjunction with reading people is a powerful combination that will give you a huge edge in any game where your opponents lack these skills.

  Based on an article by DANIEL NEGREANU