There is a large difference between a misleading tell deliberately implemented by an opponent and involuntary tells that the player may unwittingly give you at the same time. This article is designed to equip you with the basics in being able to spot and classify information your opponent gives you in a live poker setting and be able to interpret them within your analysis of the hand to lead you to the right decision. These techniques are worth noting and practising as making decisions within Texas Hold’em poker is always done so with incomplete information so anything you can use to be a little more sure of what you are doing will help your poker game.

What you can see in terms of emotion during a tense poker hand is always related to poker as the human body reacts to what it is thinking about. You can therefore link whatever you can see in terms of emotional clues from your opponent directly to their hand strength. Hiding emotion is very difficult as human beings are designed to give out emotion. We all know that most communication between us is none verbal so firstly realise that to sit and give nothing away is not something that poker players or anyone else finds very easy to do. Very few players give nothing away, if any.

Let’s assume we are bluffing in a hand and our opponent tanks and starts thinking hard about what to do while watching us intently. As time passes we feel worse and worse about the situation and you might start shaking, nervously moving, gulping or breathing fast. Note how your body aches to give something away and how uneasy you feel during the time your opponent is in thought. You want to do something, anything! Even if you start smiling and saying how much you want called as a reverse psychological ploy you are still giving away these none verbal tells.

When you are looking for involuntary tells every movement from your opponent counts. Watch for opponents breathing, blinking, staring too hard, shaking, tapping or shuffling. Focus on what they are doing rather than what they are saying because all too often verbal things will be deliberately misleading or double bluffs so you cannot be sure it is truthful. Body movements, ticks or habitual movements are much harder to conceal and players are rarely aware of them. In their mind they are Chris Ferguson in their approach. Do not let on you know different, simply use the information to help you in key poker decisions.

These sorts of live tells are similar to using online poker software when you are playing online. Knowing that a player is bluffing can be spotted through betting patterns online and using heads up displays to show their normal tendencies. In a live setting, watching the players gulp nervously at a key moment tells you a lot even if they are deliberately misleading you with enigmatic table talk at the same time.

If you watch High Stakes Poker you will see a hand where Tom “durrrr” Dwan makes a bluff against Phil Ivey that Ivey very nearly calls. Watch how nervous Tom is during the hand. Ivey eventually folds as his hand was weaker than some of the hands Tom might be gulping over but Dwan is obviously nervous. If a great player that like that struggles to hide his emotions at a key poker moment, you can definitely spot weakness in others during a poker hand.

Start watching your opponent closely from now on, the truth is out there beneath the fake tells and you can spot them if you become a body language and subtle body movement expert.

By Malcolm Clarke

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