Last night, I was in a 14 person NL tourney. I believe the players who joined were mostly average players, just one or two were really good players. The entire night, I was doing okay and was actually dominating the table. I played aggressively and was focused then on winning the pots alone.

At some point, with an average player, I got to heads up. Good side was that I had more chips, I believe 2-1. Blinds then were at 500-1000. In the small blind, I was dealt A-8 suited and so I decided to go all in with a little hope of stealing blind. Consequently, with 910 of diamonds, he called. Flop came and brought 2 diamonds. Turn followed but was a blank. Finally, river came and gave him a flush. Because of this, he won.

Now I’m wondering if my all in play with A-8 suited is a good one? I believe I had the best hand then so I went all in. I was also expecting that the guy will call as I was stealing his blinds and was pushing him.

On the other hand, in a heads up game, is going all in with any ace pre-flop effective? How about if I’m the chip leader? And do you think putting in a raise while hoping that flop would hit is far better? What about pocket pair? Or I’m the chip leader?

Sorry for the many questions. Please bear with me, I badly need your help.

Thanks,
Alexander
Alexander,

Without knowing the stack sizes etc, I can’t say whether the push was really good or not. However, raising with any ace preflop is a good play heads-up. If you went all-in, that’s not necessarily a bad play. It turned out you were ahead. You just got unlucky.

Heads up you want to raise with a wider range of hands to include pairs, any ace, and two big cards. Being the chip leader or not doesn’t matter. You want to push your big hands preflop. Otherwise, see a lot of cheap flops with your other hands and hope to flop well.

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