67 of the original 123 returned for day 2 , i was in 17th place with 23,875 , blinds were 300 600.

Keith " Camel " Hawkins was one of the table chip leaders and like me noticed the SB was missing and raised the first hand to 1600 , i thought i could pick up the pot and raised 5000 more , all passed to Keith who called , flop was checked all the way K 9 3 7 K and i won with two pair as i had J9s !

The next hand i raised to 1500 with AKs , there is one caller on the button then Lee Nelson moves in for 11,000 , i reraise all in to get it heads up , Lee has 88 , flop is 7 4 K A 3 and i am up to 43,000 , a great start .

I win another pot unchallenged with 99 then pick up AQo on the button , i raise to 1800 and Dave Barnes reraises 5000 , i elect to call as he has 11,000 left which on reflection may have been a mistake , as i had just won 20,000 chips i didn't want to risk doubling Dave up on my left but if he was just defending his blinds a reraise may have won it there and then , anyway the flop was K 6 2 and Dave moved in , i passed and he showed AT !

When you lose a pot like that it can effect your momentum and focus and i lost another small pot to Dave , i had limped with JQs and on a J T 4 bet out , he flat called , turn was another T making a flush , we both checked , river a 6 and i check called a small bet , Dave had called on the flop with AT and turned a set .

Just when everything seemed to be going wrong i won a nice pot with 9Ts , i had limped with 4 others , flop was checked all round J Q 4 , turn was the 8 giving me the nuts , now the BB bet 3000 , i raise to 7000 and he goes all in for 11,000 , i call , he has slow played a set of 4's , it doesn't pair and i end the level with 39,800 .

At this stage we have already lost two tables and there are only 49 left , seat 2 next to Dave had been vacant for a while but is now taken by Harry Demetriou on my BB with 70,000 , one of the chip leaders !

Early on i lose a pot with KQs , flop is Q 7 3 with a flush draw , i bet 1000 and get one caller , turn is a J , i bet 2500 , again a call , river is an 8 , i check call a bet of 4000 , my opponent had called on the flop with 9Ts for the flush draw and made a straight !

After a couple of rounds play has tightened up and i am yet to put Harry to the test on the BB , all pass to me on the button and i raise 2200 with 89s , both Dave and Harry call , flop is 8 6 3 , checked to me , i bet 7000 , Dave passes but Harry asks for a chip count , i have 21,000 , he reraises to put me all in , i can't make my mind up if i am outkicked or he has slow played an overpair or is using his chips with a draw like 79 , i eventually pass , Harry said he had TT .

Next time round i try a minimum raise to 1600 with 94s , they both call again , flop is 3 5 6 with my flush draw , Dave checks , Harry bets 2000 , i decide to slow play in position and this saved me , Dave reraised 26,000 all in and Harry called , i passed , Dave had slow played TT and Harry had two pair with his 35o , turn was a blank but the river a T !

I won one more pot on a flop of T Q K holding TJ with no callers to my bet then i picked up AKs again , Max raised to 2500 , wanting to know if he had a big pair , i reraised to 7000 , all passed to Max who studied me for a while and looked as though he was going to move in for his last 15,000 , i had 13,000 and would have called , eventually he flat called , i put him on JJ or QQ , flop was 9 T K rainbow , Max checked and i moved in , actually he had neither , he quickly called and flipped up 99 .

I have thought about this hand and probably however i played it i would have lost , once i raised and was called there was 15,200 in the pot , when Max checked i could have bet 6000 leaving me 7000 but if he raised unless i was certain he had a set i have to call , and there is the possibility that as there was no flush draw he may have just flat called hoping i had AK and then moved in on the turn which was a 4 . The key to this pot is that while i thought he was considering reraising all in preflop which made me put him on a bigger pair than he held , he was actually considering folding but in the end decided i may have AK and took a chance that no A or K flopped , in the end the flop was perfect for both of us , i may have considered TT but not 99 .

So i finished around 40th and apart from a couple of mistakes i was generally happy with my play and hope to do better next week in Luton .