A Gambler's Tale E-Book

Stevie Thomas

• Herausgeber: Clink Street Publishing
• Kategorie: Sachliteratur, Reportagen, Biografien
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2024

Seitenzahl: 763

Beschreibung

A Gambler's Tale consists of a collection of memories from the incredible gambling life of Stevie Thomas. From casinos to poker and everything in between, this book is a fascinating insight into the radical existence of a gambling family complete with some extraordinary tales. This book details stories from all over the world, well known names and faces, as well as providing a brief history of the gambling scene in London.

Leseprobe

A Gambler’s Tale

by Stevie Thomas

Contents

Title PageA Gambler's TaleAbout the AuthorCopyright

I have always said that if I had a chance to write about gambling stories it would be a very intriguing and exciting book indeed. This book will include some of the experiences I have encountered on my travels. I have read a few books on gambling stories and I felt that I could write a book of my own! I will share these experiences with you but obviously I will change some of the names and some of the places to protect those concerned. Everything you will read in this book is true. If you have read any gambling books in the past you will find this book quite incredible.

I said to my wife some time ago, I would like to write a book on all these fascinating events that have taken place in my life and it was she who suggested that I should sit down and put pen to paper. What happened was, when we used to entertain at dinner parties, I used to always tell a story that I had experienced in my life about gambling and throughout the evening I used to tell one or two stories that were funny and my wife said to me, “You made everyone laugh tonight, you could write a book.” So it was then that I decided to sit down and start. I said to her, “It would take a very long time indeed to start all my adventures, going back to when I was possibly four to five years old.” She said, “Well you are in no rush!” So, I sat down, probably a couple of years ago now, probably about the year 2000. We then bought a PC and we found some software that you could dictate to as it would be a lot easier because I can’t type. Well in the beginning it was great but then the software packed up halfway through and it started spelling certain things wrong and I decided to call it a day because everything was getting on top of me. Then my wife started typing a bit for me, my sister started typing a bit for me and then my niece started typing a bit for me but eventually everything faded out and we got nothing done.

It wasn’t until by pure chance one day that I met a very nice chap called Dave English who gave me the number of a lady who would sit down and do the manuscript, and it seems now that we are finally going to get something done, so I am going full steam ahead to write this book.

I started at 39 years old, I’m already 41 and we still haven’t got the final copy finished. This book will include stories of some of the biggest gambling cash games, even by todays standard. I know that the $10,000 Hold’em Event in Las Vegas is the biggest competition in the world and I know the prize money is probably $2 million now, which is about £1million but in a lot of my stories I am talking about ‘hard cash’ not tournament chips. The size of those games was well ahead of their time. Also there was a poker game that I was involved in, dealing, that was the biggest game to be known, but one slight thing, it was 35,000 ft up in the air, but I will tell you about that later on. Myself, I’ve played poker all around the world. UK, Australia, Hong Kong, Cyprus and many, many other places. Wherever there has been Five Card Stud and me knowing that there is a good straight open game, I want to get involved. I have also dealt in the biggest games in the world, for their time, and even in today’s standard as I said, they would be considered very large indeed.

My stories will include some of the top Professional Five Stud poker players and then some other stories; will consist of some modest amateur very weak poker players. Both can be quite amusing! I suppose with a book, the only problem is where do you start. My wife said to me, “Well, why don’t you start at the beginning” and I said to her “Where is the beginning?” She said, “The beginning of your gambling stories.”

So I had to think quite hard and the harder I was thinking the younger I was getting. In my mind I kept thinking of experiences of when I was young and then younger and younger. Well I can tell you I ended up at five years old and that’s when it all started.

My dad owned a casino in 1965. It was called the Wembley Spinner Club. It was a casino well ahead of its time. Wembley in those days was a very nice area with a large Jewish community. It was quite classy; I would probably say it was on a standard to Stanmore, Radlett or Elstree.

On the ground floor there were three roulette tables, a dice table and two blackjacks, on the first floor there was a poker room, & we always had buffet nights. Now it was my dad back in the 60s that introduced free drinks, free coffees and free buffets. The spread he used to put on was quite incredible. We still look at some of the Cine films today and are quite impressed. Once a week they used to hold a raffle and the first prize was a brand-new Escort car. Needless to say, on these special nights, the club used to get extremely busy. What with the complimentary drinks, food and a chance to win a car, can you imagine? In those days there were hundreds and hundreds of casinos dotted around the London area. It was quite easy to get a licence. It was not until 1969–70 the Gaming Board restricted the licences.

When I was five years old, my mum used to take my brother, sister and me into the casino on a Sunday afternoon and I remember until this day sitting on my dad’s knee watching him play poker. I also remember a couple of the players at the time because I played with them 20 to 25 years later. Sonny, French Alan, Italian Gino, to name a few, they all had nicknames. Dad also told me there was a very big Poker Player by the name of Kuros. Now Kuros has died but he owned a couple of restaurants in the West End and Kuros was a fearless poker player. Dad was telling me, he could possibly lose £10-15 grand in one night. Now you are talking about in the mid-60s. In those days a three or four bed-room house was about £6000.

They all used to play Five Card Stud Strip Deck. Five Card Stud is the mother of all poker games. It was played in the 30s, 40s and 50s back in America, but it soon died a death, because with 52 cards the action used to get a little slow and boring. When the game hit London in the mid-50s, the Cypriots and the Italians discarded the 2s, 3s and 4s and ended up with a 40-card deck. This used to give the game a little more action. It used to be a ‘no limit game’, which can be a very dangerous game indeed like the ‘no limit game’ they play in Las Vegas at the moment with Texas Hold’em. Players out there currently know that in this kind of game, you could put your entire cash at stake at any time. When the 60s came around that structure seemed to die off. What happened to the game next was that they took the 5s and the 6s out and left a 32-card deck & also changed the structure to a Pot Limit Game, so you could only bet the size of the pot, which definitely gave you a lot more action and you were able to ‘buy’ a lot more cards for your money in the course of the game. With this structure you could ‘build’ pots, knowing you could not lose all your money in one pot. Strip Deck, as is now known was born. The Americans have never played Strip Deck Poker; it never took off within the States. If you go to a couple of the card clubs in Los Angeles, you will find it in some of the rooms and they call it ‘Asian Stud’. They still play it over there in the Asian Section, but they still play No Limit. I have played it in America for three or four years and I have made money. However, I feel that you have to play very tight indeed, but I will tell you about those stories later on in the book. There was still a lot of Five Card Stud Strip Deck right up until the mid-90s but the game died and Hold’em took over. Now it seems that Hold’em has died and is being taken over by Omaha Poker. Any Omaha player will tell you, that game has got a lot of action. I will argue with anybody out there that has played in a very good Five Card Stud Strip Deck game that Five Card Stud has just as much action as Omaha.

Now, I am going to begin with one of my stories. My dad told me this story many years after it actually happened. It’s actually quite an amusing one, so I thought I should definitely share it with you.

When he had the casino between 1965–70, there used to be a customer who went there every single night of the week at 6 pm. He used to have a confectionary shop, a sweet shop. He would never leave the casino until he had lost every single penny. His sweetshop used to be around the corner and he used to walk into the casino with about £40–£50 every single night. Now you’re talking about the mid-60s, and he would never ever win! One night my dad was at home with us and he rang the casino and spoke to the manager, whose name was Sollie and asked “Any Poker players in yet Sollie?” to which Sollie replied, “Not yet Max, but our first customer in tonight was the ‘sweet-shop man’ and he’s winning a couple of hundred pounds.” Dad said to the manager, “No problem, I’ll call you in an hour and I’ll find out roughly what time the poker will start,” disregarding what Sollie said about the ‘sweet-shop man’. Dad called him back in about an hour’s time and before he asked any questions, Sollie informed Dad that the ‘sweet-shop man’ was now winning about £2000. My dad still replied to Sollie, “No problem Sollie, he’ll be there all night.” Don’t forget in those days it was 24 hours. Dad knew that this guy was an out and out gambler and he would carry on gambling and gambling. Anyway dad told me that he was not too worried about it. He was more concerned about getting the poker started. About midnight that night, the phone rang home. It was Sollie. He said “Max, I think you had better come down.” Dad said, “Why, has the poker begun?” “No Max! The ‘sweet-shop man’, he’s winning about £8000.” Now £8,000 as we said in the 60s, was a lot of money! Dad said, “I’m on my way, I’ll be down in about 15 minutes.” Well the story goes like this. This ‘sweet-shop man’ couldn’t do anything wrong that night. He was playing roulette, he was hitting number after number after number. Anything he backed was coming up. Dad even raised the limit. In those days, you could do whatever you wanted. The maximum you could have on a number at the Wembley Spinner was £5–£10 a number. Dad raised the limit to £25 a number. Dad raised the limit to £50 a number, but sure enough this guy carried on hitting number after number. Dad told me, “They changed the dealer every 20 minutes, but to no avail. At six o’clock in the morning the ‘sweet-shop man’ had accumulated every single ‘cash chip’ in the casino. Notice that I say ‘cash chip’. Cash chips are the chips that you can go and cash in. The normal coloured chips are the chips that you play at the table on the roulette. There is a reason I’m telling you this, it’s because he had accumulated every single ‘cash chip’. He then accumulated every single coloured chip on the three roulettes. At one stage the ‘sweet-shop man’ had gone delirious. He was having £4000 on black and £3000 on red. This we know is stupidity, but I think the guy had gone into oblivion, he started having £100 on a number which was a ludicrous limit in those days, but my dad being the gambler he is, just carried on raising the maximum. By 8.30 am the ‘sweet-shop man’ still couldn’t do nothing wrong. Even Sollie the General Manager started spinning the ball, but it was no use. They estimated with the ‘colour chips’ (they put a different value on those ones) each one was valued from £5 to £100 a chip, plus all the cash chips in the casino, he was estimated at winning over £150,000. I mean, this is an unbelievable and incredible amount to be winning and this kind of money in the 60s could set you up for life. The magnificent ending to this story is this. By 7.30 pm the following evening, the ‘sweet-shop man’ left the casino – he went to his car and he brought out another £5 worth of change. He had lost every single chip back within the 24-hour period. The ‘sweet-shop man’ was never ever seen again at the casino. The casino was still to be open for the next three or four years. He disappeared without trace.

Dad laughs about the story now and obviously, if the man cashed in, he would have got paid, but it could have been the end of the Wembley Spinner Club, within the first year. You must be asking yourself, “How did he manage to win this kind of money, so effortlessly,” but as I said, with my dad raising the limit and keeping on raising the limit, this was all possible.

There was another customer that used to go regularly to the Wembley Spinner Club, everybody used to call him ‘Little Norman’. Well he used to go in day in and day out and lose his money and this went on for months and months. After about six or seven months Little Norman used to come in have his drinks and have his food and not play. Dad noticed this but didn’t say anything. After all little Norman was a terrific customer. Well after nine months, Dad still didn’t say anything but there was no action coming from ‘Little Norman’. One night he wanted to meet Dad and he said, “Max, as you’ve seen I haven’t been playing in the last nine months.” Dad said, “I’ve noticed.” He said, “Max, I’ve been coming in for the buffets and all the free food and all the free drink.” Dad again said, “Yes! Norman I have noticed.” He said, “I feel bad Max.” So Dad said, “Look Norman, it’s not a problem, come in and eat and drink whenever you like.” Norman said, “I do feel bad Max because I haven’t been playing, I’m not a good customer anymore, I’ve done all my money and I can’t play anymore.” Dad said, “Norman it’s not a problem come and eat and drink whenever you like you’re my guest.” Norman said, “I’ve got an idea.” Dad said, “What is it?” Norman said, “Can you give me a job?” Dad said, “Are you kidding me?” He said, “No Max! I love the Wembley Spinner so much. I love your food here. I love your drink, I love the company and I love the Casino; I’m here every night, even though I’m not playing. I wanna job?” Within a week Norman was a dealer and a Croupier at the Wembley Spinner Club! One night, Dad told me Little Norman span the wheel and span 26, 26, 0, 0, 3333! Which is unbelievable because if you play roulette, you’ll know they are all next to each other on the wheel!

One night when there weren’t enough poker players to get a full game going, one of the players that were there challenged my dad to Heads Up Poker. He must have been a brave man, his name was ‘Sonny’. A very experienced poker player at Five Card Stud and he is still on the circuit today. Dad said to him, “Let’s get it on Sonny, if you want to play me Heads Up, I’ll play you.” As they were to begin the game, Dad realised that they were playing with 52 cards, a full deck. Sonny said to my dad, “Max, I’m not playing you Heads Up Strip Deck, because you are unbeatable, I want to play you Full Deck.” To which my dad replied, “No problem Sonny, deal them.” The game lasted three and half hours and my dad lost his money. Apparently, Sonny was a very good Five Card Stud Full Deck player and Dad, not knowing the mechanics of how to play Full Deck, told me that he was outclassed by Sonny. In the years gone he had played a 40-card deck with the 5s and 6s included, but this was a different ball game, Sonny had the beating of Dad. Well Sonny came in the next day and said, “Max you on for a game?” Dad said, “Let’s go Sonny.” The same result, Sonny won money off of my dad. The night after, guess what? Sonny turned up again. “Hey Max,” he said, “Want to play again?” My Dad looked at him and said, “Sonny no more full deck with you, I will play you Strip Deck.” To which Sonny replied, “Come on Max, Strip Deck you’re too good!” Dad turned around and said, “Sonny full deck you’re too good!” I’ve never ever played Five Card Stud with 52 cards, I thought it would be a very slow and boring game, but something was to happen very recently and I will tell you about that towards the end of the book that made me change my mind.

One night my dad popped into the Spinner early, it was quiet but he noticed that there was one customer standing all by himself at the bottom of the casino on the dice table. He walked over and he noticed it was Stan the minicab driver. They used to call him ‘Stan the man’. Now Stan, was a regular punter at the Wembley Spinner Club, he was also the driver for the club, so any customers that wanted to be driven home he would drive them, get the cab fare and then come back and gamble. Dad noticed on this particular night that Stan wasn’t gambling. Dad walked over to Stan and said, “How are you doing, are you winning or are you losing?” Stan replied, “Max I’ve lost my money tonight, I can’t even have another bet, all I’ve got left is this 2/6 p chip [which is about 12.5 p in today’s currency].” Now the minimum at the Wembley Spinner on the dice on the front line or the pass line was 5 shillings, which is 25 p so Stan is standing there with this 2/6 p chip in his hand and he can’t even have a bet. My Dad said to Stan, “Stan put your 2/6 p chip on the front line and I’ll tell the Croupier to match it, so that you can have a bet.” Stan said, “That’s very kind of you Max, because I’ve been losing my money a long time at the Wembley Spinner Club.” Anyway Stan put his 2/6 p chip on the front line. Dad told the Croupier to put another 2/6 p chip on top and Stan picked up the dice. Stan made a couple of numbers and he had £3–£4 in front of him. Dad walked away and went up to the office to make a few phone calls to see who was coming in to play poker that night. About an hour later the manager Sollie phoned up the office, and said, “Max, Stan the man, has just left, he was telling everybody that you gave him an extra 2/6 p.” Dad said, “That’s right Sollie, not a problem.” He said, “Well Max, that 5 shillings that he put on the front line has just won him £1800”! Dad said to Sollie, “Are you kidding me?” Sollie said, “No Max, he was throwing the dice for over an hour, anything he was betting was winning.” Dad said, “I can’t believe that.” Sollie replied, “It’s true, he has just walked out of the casino, winning £1800.” Well Dad tells me that he didn’t worry about it too much because as I said, Stan was the regular driver, and a regular customer. That night the story went around the casino and Dad was saying to Sollie during the night, “Don’t worry, Stan the man will be back, it’s probably a good thing that he has had a ‘touch’ and won that money.” Well the following night came and yes Stan the man walked in at about 9 pm. He saw my dad and he said, “Max I’ve got to thank you very much.” Dad said, “I know Stan, I heard all about it, we are going to get some action from you tonight.” He looked up at Dad and said, “Max can you follow me outside please”? They walked outside the Wembley Spinner Club and as they got outside the front door Stan said, “I want to thank you Max, because without you I wouldn’t have won that money.” Dad replied, “Well I know that Stan, you are welcome.” Stan said, “No, I also want to thank you Max, because not only did I win that money, I went out this morning and bought this lovely new Jaguar parked over there, so that I can do some executive minicab driving and because of that 2/6 p chip that you gave me, I was able to have that first bet, win that money and buy a lovely new car! I promise you Max, I will be the Wembley Spinner driver until the day it closes… but I don’t know if I’m going to gamble any more!”

Now, I’m going to tell you a little bit about my father. My father is known in the gambling world as one of the most fearless poker players and also one of the strongest Five Card Stud players on the planet and that’s no joke. In fact, his forte (his strongest point) is Heads Up (match poker). In fact very recently, Dad was playing Hold’em at the Vic, which is a casino in London and he was playing in a ten-handed game, and he was playing so aggressively that one of the Hendon Mob, Barney, emailed me the next day and said. “I tell you what, in a fight, I want your Dad on my side, because he just ‘pounds’ away at the pot!” Now when it’s Heads Up you can afford to play very, very aggressively and believe you me, he will take on anybody head-to-head at Five Card Stud. In fact recently on the internet there was a challenge by four or five current professional poker players, challenging anybody in the world to any poker game of their choice, at any stake. This challenge was out over the internet, because of the Vienna Heads Up World Championship, which was a Heads Up Hold’em. I replied to all five professionals, that my father would play them one by one Heads Up Five Card Stud and a minimum stake of $10,000 and no limit maximum, but the game had to be Strip Deck Five Card Stud pot limit. All five declined the offer. One replied and he said, “He would play, but there was a small snag as he wanted to play also ‘Heads Up Omaha’. The guy’s name was Dave and is also known as ‘The Devil Fish’, a very strong Omaha player. A very, very good gambler doesn’t play Five Card but the way he sees it, he would give it a bash. I’m sure he knows Five Card but his forte is Omaha. Well Dad declined the Omaha and wanted to play Five Card, but Dave declined the Five Card. I replied and said it was them who put the challenge over the internet. Nothing ever evolved and there was never a game. My dad’s reputation is obviously world-renowned.

You see when he sits at a poker table he could have very, very big ‘swings’. Some nights he could actually skin the table, take everybody’s money one by one and on the nights if his cards are not going well, he could lose money. He could lose big money, but overall in the last 55 years of playing, his winnings at Five Card Stud outweigh big time the losses. His wins some nights are humongous and the losses could be big, but that’s the style of his play. Me on the other hand, a lot of people say that I play a lot more carefully. My wins aren’t as big on my winning nights as my dad, but my losses on the losing nights are usually very small. As a few people have said in the past, the difference between my dad and I at Five Card Stud is that you have more value with my dad, but the result is still the same. Whether it’s father or son we win, you lose!

In the early 60s, Dad was telling me about when he was playing poker in North London; he had lost a considerable amount of money one night. He found out the next day that the cards had been marked and he was actually cheated out of that money. Now, the money he lost was ‘Markers’. Markers means when you’ve got credit and you have to pay the next day or the day after. My Dad found out that the cards were marked, but just to let you know the gentleman my dad is, he went back the following day and paid them the money he had lost. You might ask why? And I also asked him why? He said, “If you lose money at poker and it’s on credit and you go back the next day and say I’m not paying because I was cheated, it always sounds sour grapes. Be a man, pay your losses, wipe your mouth, you keep your name clean and afterwards you can also say, ‘I didn’t like the game,’ but once you’ve paid, then they might get the message. That’s just a little bit of the character of my dad.

Time for another small story. This time a short and funny one. My dad had a small club and casino in Haringey, North London, it was called the Empress Club. He received a phone call at home, by the manager; his name was Dinos. They used to call him ‘Mr Beans’, because he was always lively. Someone was playing The Maximum on The First Dozen on the roulette. That means from number 1 to number 12. Then obviously, Dad told the manager to keep him updated on the action, because apparently, this customer was winning quite a lot of money. This guy couldn’t stop winning on betting the first dozen. Dad went down to the Club to see what was going on, because the manager and the dealer mentioned that the first dozen was coming up quite regularly. My dad got down there and after about half an hour decided to stop the game and close the table. The whole roulette table was full of customers. So Dad wasn’t a popular guy when he stopped the game in mid action and said, “This table is now closed.” One of the guys was winning £7–8000. Mid-60s again! The table was closed and Dad paid the guy. After closing time, he then examined the roulette wheel and found many of the numbers had the gaps closed slightly, so the wheel was favouring the first dozen. This, we call in the gambling trade “The wheel was biased.” This was another expensive lesson for my dad, in today’s casinos all roulette wheels are balanced, checked and investigated so the wheel has no bias and they do this on a regular nightly basis.

There was another customer that used to go every single night to the Empress Club and he used to bet on red and black and for a long time he never lost. I’ll tell you his system. He used to start off having £5 on red or black. If it lost, £10. If it lost, £20. If it lost, £40. If it lost, £80 etc. etc. This we know is a doubling up system. As any of you reading this, you will say, you will always lose your money at that system and the reason you will lose is that nowadays they have limits. Most limits on red and black is £10,000 and even with those kinds of limits if the red or black comes up consecutively 12 times on the trot, you would have lost a lot of money, in fact you would have reached the limit. This guy never, ever, lost, Dad was telling me. There was no limit on the red and black at the Empress Club. That’s right, no limit on the ‘even money’ chances. I mean this in itself was ludicrous and I actually asked my dad recently why was there no limit. My Dad said, that back in the early 60s all the London casinos and there were many of them, used to have no limit on the even money chances. Obviously, this in unheard of nowadays. Well this young man used to walk in and play his doubling up system. Many nights, the young man used to walk out of the Empress winning between £50 and £100 without a problem. This went on for months and months until one night, Dinos (Mr Beans), the Croupier, who I’ve mentioned before, span 17 reds on the trot! That’s right, 17 reds one after the other. The guy had done his entire cash flow all in one night and his entire winnings for the last six or seven months and when I say he lost the entire lot, this man used to walk in sometimes with £8–£10 grand. He’d lost the whole lot within the first 13 spins! That just goes to show you doubling up on the roulette is definitely not a good system. I know many gamblers that have tried it and many failed, except one, well I’ll get to that later on.

There used to be regular poker games at the club in Haringey and just around the corner was where my grandfather and grandmother used to live. I’m telling you this for a reason, because my grandfather was very much against gambling. He accepted it with my dad because my dad always told him that it was his business but to tell you the truth he was dead against it. One night there was a very big game at the club and there came a pot between my dad and a guy named Tony and after the last card, Tony ended up with a possible straight and my dad had a pair of 10s on the show and it was my dad to bet. My dad checked to the possible straight and Tony bet the full pot £1150. This was a lot of money in the 60s and probably equivalent to £10-£12 grand in this day and age. Dad started thinking and as Dad glanced across the room, he saw my grandfather, who must have come in; just standing there watching this pot. Now Dad tells me he wanted to call Tony but he didn’t want to do it in front of my grandfather, just in case Tony had the straight. To lose £1150, probably would have given my grandfather a heart attack! The Croupier said to my dad, “Are you calling or are you passing?” My dad said, “I’m thinking.” He looked up again and my grandfather had now walked closer to the table to have a better look at this pot. So Dad said to him, “Father you couldn’t make me a cup of coffee could you?” To which he replied, “Yes in a minute I will.” Dad tells me my grandfather wouldn’t move from the table until he had seen the end of this pot. He stood there and after a couple of minutes, my dad said to the Croupier, “Pass my cards, Tony you win.” My grandfather then said to my dad, “I’ll make you that coffee now,” and he walked out of the room. My dad looked at Tony and he said to him. “Do you know what, if the ‘old man’ wasn’t here, I swear to God, I’d call your £1150 bet because I think you were bluffing, but I didn’t want to take a chance in front of the old man because if I’d called the bet and you’d had the straight, it would have killed him… and that’s why you made this bet to me because you saw my father was in the room and you knew 99% that I wouldn’t call you.” Tony turned over his hole card and he said to my dad, “Your right Max, I was bluffing… thinking about what you’ve just said, maybe, just maybe I shouldn’t play poker with you.”

Back in 1969, we spent quite a lot of time in Plymouth, down in the south west. Dad had some very good friends down there. They had a casino, a hotel and a card club. All the family used to go down there for the summer holidays Dad popping down for three or four days at a time, as he was still running the two casinos in London.

When he used to get down to Plymouth, his friends always used to arrange a poker game, which sometimes used to continue throughout the next day. We used to go and see Dad at the Card Club, just as they were finishing the game the next day. There was a poker player, who when he used to see me, my brother and sister walking in, we’re all about seven, eight or nine years old, he would slowly take three £5 notes from my dad’s pile and he used to craftily give them to us, when my dad wasn’t looking. I remember this quite vividly as we were only young and certain things always stick in your mind and £5 was a lot of money. A lady named Yanulla, who was a friend of my mums, whose husband was playing poker, said to my mum. “All those poker players, they are snakes in the grass, playing for two or three days at a time.” Many poker games my dad has been in at the Wembley Spinner Club used to start on Friday night and finish on Sunday afternoons, many, many times. While we are on the subject of Plymouth, Dad used to go to Torquay, quite a lot, which was about 20 miles away. He used to play very big Heads Up poker, with a guy called John. Dad tells me he had four or five very big match ‘Heads Up Poker’ games with him and he never lost.

The reason I’m telling you this is, apparently many nights John used to host other poker games, where an English guy named Mike used to go on a regular basis. This Mike lost a small fortune. We don’t know exactly how much he lost, but a lot of people said he lost his house and he lost his business, playing in these games in Torquay. Mike the English guy found out that the games were supposedly bent. He’d heard that he had been cheated. Now whether he was or whether he wasn’t we’ll never know, but one night I can tell you this. He got himself drunk in Plymouth and he jumped in his car and he was racing along the street. He saw one of my dad’s best friends Gregory from Plymouth and Gregory said to him. “Mike! Where are you going? And Mike replied, “I’m going to kill John, I’ve heard, I’ve been cheated for the last six months.” Gregory said. “Don’t be silly Mike, you’re crazy!” Gregory was by the side of the car. Mike pulled out a gun and he said, “Let me go Gregory! I’m going to kill him. Gregory run off and jumped back in his car and Mike sped off. The police on the motorway then stopped Mike. He obviously, was going well above the speed limit. As the policeman went up to the car, Mike shot the policeman dead. He jumped back in his car and he got to the casino. Mike walked into the casino and shot the manager dead and the Croupier. I know this is all true, because Mike is still in prison, as I write this book. My friend’s uncle whose nickname was ‘Ginger’ was working at the casino at the very time this happened. He told us this story. He obviously, caught the end of the story and Gregory told me the beginning. Ginger told us the guy walked in, guns blazing, like a movie. Ginger dived under the table for cover. Needless to say, Mike was caught and sentenced to life imprisonment.

There was another casino in Torquay and it was owned by another Greek, named Babbis. Dad told me he went in there with Rocky and Gregory, his friends, one night and the very first number Dad backed was number 16 to the maximum. This was the first bet that Dad had at the Casino that night. The ball span and landed straight into number 16. Dad took his winnings and placed all of them, on and around number 16. The ball span again, and bang straight into number 16 repetition. Babbis came over to the roulette wheel and said, “This roulette table is now closed!” Dad said, “Why?” and Babbis repeated, “I said, this roulette table is now closed!” Dad cashed in and had won about £4000 in two spins and had walked out with Rocky and Gregory within five minutes of walking in. Even in today’s casinos, floor managers are able to close any game at any time on the casino floor, if they think there is something wrong. There was nothing wrong that night, Dad was just lucky!

The year is 1969. Dad still had the Casino in Wembley and got involved in buying some greyhounds as the Wembley Spinner Club was quite close to Wembley Dog Track. I think this was meant to be a business venture and a bit of pleasure combined. I think Dad knew at the back of his mind, that the casino he had in Wembley, had to close by June or July 1970, as the Gaming Board sat around at that time and decided to close many casinos outside the centre of London. Dad invested quite a lot of money in buying a small litter. He then decided to call them after the Wembley Spinner Club. He named one dog, ‘Spinners Club’, another, ‘Spinners Dice’, the other ‘Spinners Glory’, ‘Spinners Chance’ etc. etc., the last one was my one. My brother, sister and I had one each. My one, his real name was Bobby, but he used to run under the name of ‘Spinners Chance’. I remember that quite well, because on Sundays we used to go up to South Mimms Kennels and all of us used to spend Sunday afternoons walking the dogs for a bit of exercise. In fact we had a photo taken, which appeared in the Sporting Life. Anyway, I’ll tell you about my dog, it was an absolute donkey! It never, ever won a single race. Not one I tell you. I mean we used to go to Wembley on Saturdays, Haringey, Mondays and Fridays. We used to go to the track on a regular basis and I always used to back, maybe 20 p, or maybe 30 p. At nine years old, betting on my dog and it always finished last! Maybe that’s why I don’t really gamble nowadays, because I remember the hurtful feeling when I lost my money on my dog. Knowing my dad, he probably used to lose as well. Now on the other hand ‘Spinners Dice’ which belonged to my sister, actually won some very good graded races. I think, to cut a long story short, with all these greyhounds, reading in between the lines, it was not a very good business at all. Dad has never told us to this day. I think he lost a small fortune, following those bloody dogs! I’m not too sure, but I can tell you this, we went out for dinner not so long ago with some very close friends. Peter, one of the guys that we were with wanted to buy a dog at Walthamstow, which was being auctioned. It was in a charity event and Dad in no uncertain terms, kept on saying to him, “Don’t do it Peter, don’t do it Peter, don’t buy it, don’t buy it.” Peter was bidding and bidding and Dad was saying, “Leave it, leave it.” Dad tried to put Peter off and thankfully Peter decided not to up his offer. Dad said to Peter, “I’ve had greyhounds in the past and it’s not a very good idea.” I think if you mention the idea of buying a greyhound to my dad, he seems to be very concerned indeed.

After Dad got rid of the dogs, he decided to have a share with a guy named Harry Bubbles at Hackney Wick dog track. Now Harry Bubbles had a pitch twice a week and he used to run a book. He was called Harry Bubbles because his main business was glass blowing and they used to call him ‘Bubbles’. In fact, he was a very successful glass blower and he had made a lot of money. So the dogs to him, was a bit of a pastime. So anyway, Dad has 50–50 with Harry Bubbles. Now the problem here was that Harry Bubbles was a compulsive gambler, he wasn’t really a bookie. Now he brings my dad in because, I think, he wasn’t doing so well, but there you’ve got my dad who is a bookmaker and a very big gambler, and Bubbles an out and out gambler, what a combination! Well I’ll tell you exactly what happens when you put that combination together. They used to stand up and take loads of money for the favourite. In fact Dad always used to go a bigger price than the rest of the bookmakers. If the favourite was evens, Dad would go 5/4. If the favourite was 7/4, Dad would go 2/1. You name it, Dad would lay bigger. Dad used to say, “Harry, lets lay this dog to the maximum.” Harry used to say, “Let’s do it Max.” Well, that’s OK but one slight thing here, they used to take all the money that they’d laid on the favourite for the race and give it to the bookmaker next door and back the second favourite! Well this as anybody in the gambling business will tell you is suicide. Dad being the bookmaker wanted to lay big and Harry being the out and out punter, wanted to bet big. This was definitely a recipe for disaster. Now sometimes in a race they didn’t used to lay any favourite money. They used to lay the second favourite or the third favourite, so what did they used to do? They used to up the price and get as much money as they could for the second or third favourite and take all the money and back the favourite! The partnership with Harry and Dad, I think lasted three months. Dad pulled out after losing week after week. I think Harry lasted another six weeks and the pitch was again available at Hackney Wick, so we’ll say no more on that subject.

Sure enough in 1970 the casino closed. Probably, 1970–71 was quite lean times for my dad. Not that we would ever know, because we always had everything we ever needed. He could probably write his own book and more, which could cover these times in much greater detail. In 1971 we saw the opening of the SP office in North London. He is now a bookmaker by trade and a property developer. He always had his Bookmaking Licence and I think he was one of the first, if not the first Cypriot legal bookmaker in London, if not the UK. Dad used to renew his Bookmaking Licence, since the early 60s, but he never used it. Once the casino closed and the greyhounds weren’t winning, it was time to go into the ‘bookmaking business’. My brother and I used to go up to the office every Saturday and watch the afternoon racing. I had seen enough of dogs and horses by the time I was ten years old to last me a lifetime!

1971 (at 10 years old), was a very big year for me, because this was the year that I had my first ever poker game. The games only lasted two weeks. What I didn’t realise in the next 30 years, I have never been in a poker school that has lasted more than nine months and that’s because I ended up the only winner in every school I’ve entered. The games in 1971 though were stopped for a very different reason completely. I’ll tell you why and how. We used to go to Margate for our summer holidays. In those days Margate was the place to go. You were very lucky indeed if you found a space on the beach to place your deck chair. Well anyway, we used to stay with our auntie in a very nice house and our cousin used to come over. He still lives in Margate to this day, poor fella! His name was Dassos. One day it was raining, so instead of bringing his football to play with in the garden, he bought a deck of cards. He told us he was going to play poker and the game we were going to play was Five Card Stud. I had never played before, but it came to me like second nature. Maybe because I used to sit down and watch my dad and take in all the information without me even knowing it, but at the end of three or four sessions with our cousin, I had won a lot of money, which might have only been about £10–£15 at the time, but the games were stopped. Not because I was a winner, but because my auntie found out that we were gambling for real money. She took away the cards and she said that she was going to tell my dad. “As soon as he comes to Margate, I’m going to tell him,” she said. (Meanwhile, during that summer he was involved with some very big games in London at the time and I’ll tell you about them in a minute.) But anyway, Dad came down and my Auntie told him. He pulled my brother and me into the kitchen and he looked at both of us and he said in a very stern voice, “I heard you’ve been gambling,” to which I replied cheekily as per usual, “Yeah! But I’ve been winning!” He then told both of us that, if he ever caught us playing cards again, he would make us eat the deck. Not hit the deck, eat the deck! I think those words definitely worked on my brother, because as it turned out he could never play poker. But with me, I’m afraid it had the opposite effect and it opened my appetite to play Five Card Stud for the rest of my life. Maybe it’s because I was hungrier than my brother to be a good poker player. That tells you also something about gambling, people say it’s learnt behaviour, I don’t know, some people say it’s genetic, we still don’t know. I know poker players who I do play with, they could play for the next 20 years and they never improve. Their game is always the same. There are some that improve to a certain standard and then they stay still. I think this you can apply to any sport, whether it is poker, football or tennis. Anything you do, you improve to a certain standard and then if you have a gift you go further.

I did mention in the last story when I was on about Margate that Dad was involved in some very big games in 1971–72. They were in London and I’ll tell you about them. They were in a casino club called The Pair of Shoes. They were playing Five Card Stud and the table stakes were £2000 minimum, a lot of money! Dad told me they were very, very good action games, and very big for their time. Dad wasn’t playing in the early days, when the games had started, because of one thing and another and business commitments and what with the casino closing and other adventures he was doing. When I talk to Dad about those days, he caught the tail end of the games. He told me he was winning quite a lot of money at one stage. There was an Iranian guy over a period of a year that lost an absolute fortune. His estimated loss in one year in that game was one million pounds! His name was Hamir. Everybody on the table was winning every session twice a week. Apparently, he was an extremely open and aggressive poker player. He definitely went to the wrong table that year! He was playing against the top Five Card Stud poker players that have ever played the game. I’ll tell you their names, Israeli Simon, French Alan, Maverick, just to name a few. But as I said when Dad came in at the tail end of the game, he was also winning a lot of money, but then there came one big night, it happened on the very last hand of the night. My dad was dealt an ‘ace showing’ and an American guy was showing ‘a Queen’ and Hamir was showing ‘a 7’. So that was ace to my dad, Queen to the American and 7 to Hamir. The Ace, my dad opened for £50, the Queen raised £100, the 7 called £150. My dad re-raised the pot and the American guy and Hamir both called. There was already a couple of grand in the pot at this stage. Dad hit an 8, showing ace 8, the American guy hit a 9, showing Queen 9 and Hamir hit a King, showing 7, King. It was the ace 8 to bet. My Dad bet the full pot, about £2000. The American with the Queen 9 showing called. Hamir raised £8000 with the 7 King showing. Now to me this seems like Hamir has got a pair of Kings. When it came round to my dad, he re-raised the pot. Now I can tell you my dad had aces. Dad re-raised about £14,000. The American guy called “All in” and Hamir re-raised the rest of his money. There were two cards to come. My Dad hit an 8. Now he’s showing Ace/8/8. The American guy hit a King, he’s now has showing Queen/9/King and Hamir hit a Queen, he showed 7/King/Queen. It’s obvious now before the last card, what everybody had. Dad had aces and 8s. The American guy only had two Queens and Hamir had two Kings. With already one King and Queen out, it was going to be very difficult for my dad to lose this massive pot. Well as you know this is going to be one of those ‘bad beat’ stories because Hamir hit the very last King on the very last card to win over a £90,000 pot! He had made three Kings with the last hand of the night. The games continued but one day Hamir disappeared. Reading in between the lines he had lost an absolute fortune at the poker table and also at the same time he was playing roulette. He has never been seen since.

In 1972–73, there were no longer these massive poker games, because any poker player will tell you, you always need a ‘star’ at the table. A ‘star’ means someone who is willing to throw his money away, and you always need one star. It isn’t any good with seven or eight professionals sitting at a table because at the end of the day, no one will get the money; you need a star to feed the table. With the disappearance of Hamir, the games lost a lot of life, they continued for a while, but they were dead. The games did continue at the Curzon House, but in those couple of years, he never went, as he had opened another gambling club in Leyton. It was in Leyton High Road, in London. With me being only 11 or 12 years old at the time, I only went there a handful of times. Dad tells me there were some very good poker games there a couple of times a week, but they were definitely not in the same league as ‘The Pair of Shoes’. Dad was with a guy called Mark (they were business partners). There used to be a full-sized snooker table on the ground floor. Apparently, Mark was a much better snooker player than my dad, when they used to play for nothing, which was very rarely the case. Mark would absolutely thrash my dad ‘out of sight’, but what they used to do, was play for £500 a game. Dad tells me, when they were playing for this kind of money, the game seemed to ‘even up’ a little bit. It just goes to show you, especially in gambling when the stakes get high, whether you are playing poker or any other sport, you might not be on top of your game when the pressure is really on. That’s not taking anything away from Mark. Dad tells me he was a fantastic and terrific gambler, with ‘a lot of bottle’ as we say. He used to gamble on many things, but it so happened on the snooker table, with the stakes being so high, it used to be a level game.

In 1974, I remember watching the World Cup Final, Holland and West Germany. Mark and many others at the Club winning a small fortune with Germany winning the World Cup. The poker games were still going quite strong in Leyton and a small story here about my uncle. He used to deal in the poker games and get tips. As soon as he earn’t enough money dealing, what did he used to do? He used to sit down and play. I heard this story from a guy called Rocky in Plymouth very recently. My Uncle Andy and my dad were involved in a big pot together and my dad made a £500 bet at the very end of the pot. My Uncle Andy was thinking and thinking and thinking. He picked up his money and he said to my dad, “Do you know if I call this bet and I lose, I’m not going to go on holiday tomorrow?” My dad, as cool as a cucumber, looked at him emotionless and said, “Andy! You can call or you can pass!” To which my Uncle Andy stood up at the table and repeated in a louder voice. “Do you know, if I call this bet and lose I’m not going on holiday tomorrow!” to which again my dad said emotionless, “Andy! You can call or you can pass!” To which my Uncle said, “I call the bet, I call the £500.” My Dad looked at him and said…. “You’re not going on holiday tomorrow! I’ve got a straight and I’ve got you beat!” If you knew my dad, he would play poker with anyone. There are no friends on the poker table. Needless to say, and may I hasten to add, my Uncle Andy still went on holiday the next day and I think it must have been because my dad, made sure he did, if you know what I mean.

There was another small story about my dad and my uncle at the poker table and this was on a different night when they were playing together. This time it was my uncle that made a big bet on the last card and this time it was my dad who was thinking whether to call or pass.

The story goes like this. My dad was thinking for a minute. He then got up and walked around the table to where my uncle was sitting. Slowly my dad placed his hand on my uncle’s heart for a couple of moments. He then walked back to his seat and sat down and he said, “Andy, I pass, you’ve got me beat, I think you’ve got the winning hand, pass my cards,” he said to the dealer. So, my Uncle Andy looked up and said, “Why did you pass? I was winning, why didn’t you call the bet?” My dad replied, “Because your heart wasn’t beating fast enough!” He continued to say, “If your heart was beating fast, when I felt it, then I would have thought you were bluffing, but it wasn’t and you weren’t!”

In the early 70s, around ’73, ’74 (around those years) Dad still had the lease for the Casino, which had now closed. He gave my uncle Ron a couple of nights to run as a nightclub. He used to run it as a disco, Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights. Never earn’t a penny never could get it off the ground! Who’s going to go to a disco in Wembley in the early 70s? Uncle Ron never knew what to do! Dad never knew what to do. Uncle Ron came up with a great idea. This idea he had, had never been done in London, especially in Wembley. He turned it into one of London’s first Reggae Clubs. Twice a week Fridays and Saturdays were Reggae Nights. He used to tell me he got on with everybody. Everybody loved my Uncle Ron. They used to come in from South London, North London, and East London. All the people used to love the Reggae Nights with my Uncle Ron. My Uncle Ron got good DJs in and the nights all of a sudden, were ‘kicking’. Many times there was trouble at the Club, my Uncle Ron was in the middle. He was the peacemaker. Any problems, see Uncle Ron! There was a bit of trouble one night, two guys had had an argument in the toilet of the club and one of the guys who wasn’t known as a trouble-maker at all, said to my uncle Ron, “I’m going to kill that man tomorrow, he’s upset me.” That’s all that was said. Apparently, as the story goes, the next day he walked into a betting shop in South London and stabbed the guy dead. There was frequently trouble at the Wembley Reggae Club and slowly, slowly I think Uncle Ron had had enough. It closed its doors for the last time. That was the end of the Wembley Spinner Casino and the Wembley Reggae Club.

In 1974, saw me going to a new school. It was in Swiss Cottage, in Eton Avenue. It was a very small school with approximately a couple of hundred pupils. I was 13 at the time and in lunchbreaks when it was raining, we used to have to stay in the classroom and entertain ourselves. Sometimes people used to go from class to class. I used to pop into the fifth year and I made a friend and his name was Hamid. What I did notice about the fifth-year pupils was that on their lunchbreaks, which they spent inside, they used to play cards. I used to watch them for five or ten minutes and I realised that they were playing Five Card Stud and it seemed to me that there was one girl in particular; her name was Michelle, who used to be a regular winner. I asked a couple of times, if I could sit down and play, but I was always refused because I was only a third year and 13 years old, they were 15 and 16. Sometimes they used to play six or seven handed and there used to be some very good games, with the pots going up to £10–£20 a time. This was a lot of money, as I was only getting £1.50 pocket money. I had to find an angle to get in the games. After a couple of months, I found a way. I asked Hamid to sit down, who by the way was a non-gambler and a non-poker player to play for about ten minutes. I then walked in, started watching as per usual, he would complain of a headache and suggested that I sit down and play for him. In fact it was my money and I was going to play for myself. Well this worked a treat. Hamid played for about 15 minutes. He was losing about £4–£5. I suggested that I play for Hamid. They weren’t keen at first, but I said. “Hey! I’ve never played poker before, give me a chance.” I lost £10 but this was not on purpose. I feel even today, even when I play poker that when I sit down with a new school, sometimes it takes me a couple of sessions to get the feel of the players. Not always, but sometimes. This can work big time in your favour and all poker players out there know this, if you go into a new poker school and you win all the money for the first few times, you won’t be welcome.