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If you play Poker regularly with six other players, you will be dealt the best hand about one seventh of the time. If all the pots are the same size, and if everybody stays in to the end of every hand, you’ll tend to win about one hand per round and break even. There will be variations in the winning and losing, but who wins and who loses, and the amounts won and lost, will be strictly matters of luck.

But while Poker games played by children for pennies are like this, most are not. The key to doing better than breaking even in the long run may be described as pot-management. The three following rules, if studied and applied should help in this area.

1. Minimise your contributions to hands in which you have a high probability of losing.

This involves a willingness to drop out of hands when the probability of losing is moderately high, even if the possibility of winning is still there. Remember that while poor players pay attention to possibilities, good players pay attention to probabilities.

2. Stay in and win some hands that you would have lost if the best hand had not dropped out.

This usually occurs when your betting tactics force the opponents who may ultimately have outdrawn you to fold, although it can also occur because you actually bluffed out a better hand.

3. Make sure that the pots you stay in and win are bigger than the pots you stay in and lose.

This entails pot-building. Knowledge of pot building is another area that distinguishes the good players from the average ones.