Grosvenor casino - Blackpool

Well just for a change of poker scenery last week I took a short trip to Blackpool, a popular Lancashire seaside family resort in the North West of England in order to compile the first of poker web sites offline poker casino reviews.

One of 34 casinos the Grosvenor chain has throughout the UK, I expected the Blackpool one to be bigger, somehow more impressive, as I entered the staff were nice and friendly and I had a full membership (for free) within 15 minutes.

Armed with my nice little green membership card I entered the casino. I was greeted with the expected rows of slot machines which have had no interest for me since I was 12, I made my way up to the bar and got myself a complimentary glass of coke (I rarely drink alcohol when playing) and took in my surroundings. The poker playing area was empty as I was a few hours early for the scheduled 8.30 start so after quickly registering for the £30 + £3 tournament I cashed in a few chips to play the tables.

In total there are only 8 proper casino tables. 3 blackjack, 4 roulette, 1 three card stud and 1 five card stud. I don’t like the five card stud game in casinos as the odds are stacked against the player and after a few spins on roulette (with no real joy) I gravitated to my favourite casino table, 3 card stud. I managed to hit a straight flush early on so I pocketed the winnings and had a coffee whilst I waited on the main event to start.

The poker table area is quite large, with room for 20 or so tables with 10 and a dealer on each. The computerised system is quite cool as it displays the same stats from online poker on several big screens, average chips, total players, players out, chip leader stack size and so on so I was able to combine my online poker strategies based on chip position as well as reading the game and make informed decisions about how long till the blinds got serious and when I needed to take risks.

Managing to hit a few nice hands and being able to play a few in (and take them out), I was established as tournament chip leader inside 8 hands, so I decided to take my time and play conservatively for a bit.  I remained table leader and high up in the tournament for about 3 hours as players dropped until we were down to 30 to go with payouts starting at position 9. 

Whilst playing, I chatted to a lot of players at the table and discovered nearly all had played online at one time or another and now considered this kind of game a novelty as opposed to the traditional opposite view, which reinforces my view that online poker is now the mainstream with the offline version more of a novelty or for the really big events.

The game play though is a lot different and I did enjoy the challenge of reading players little tell tale signs and give away mannerisms.  Once the novices were gone though and only the serious players were left it did get a bit tedious as a lot of players took their time to annoy and put off other players and I was wishing for the timers most online poker tournaments use, however it did add to the tension somewhat and the dealers played a good game on the close hands playing the table cards slow to heighten that tension even more.

I finished 12th on the night and thoroughly enjoyed the event even though I didn’t make the payout positions.  I think my online experience really complimented my play though and wasn’t an issue as I was able to read the card play better than reading the “poker faces”, I had a few bad beats threw in towards the end where I made the right move on calling a few big hands but got beat by the river but hey that’s poker!

I’m looking forward to my next offline poker event and will be sure to write and tell you all how it went.

Blackpool Casino scores:

Friendliness – 10/10
Competitions ability – 8/10
Casino – 7/10
Choice of events – 5/10 (only one tournament per night)
Dealers – 8/10 (although they kept the best dealers for the final few tables)

Total score – 38/50