When the river card was also a blank, Seidel shoved all-in. The commentator summed up the excitement at the reveal: “Erik Seidel cannot win this hand, and yet he doesn’t know it! Chan is trying to sucker him in!” In those days, the hole cards were not shown to viewers until the turn. Both men checked, Chan still trapping Seidel into a false sense of security. Resisting the temptation to raise again, Chan simply called, with a show of reluctance. Seidel had no more than top pair with a weak kicker. Holding J-9 suited, Chan flopped a straight. But Chan’s strategy was to use his rival’s self-confidence and aggression against him, and he laid the perfect trap. Seidel is himself an excellent player who seems only to improve with age: he has won eight WSOP bracelets. On the final table, Chan ended up heads-up against Erik Seidel. For most players that would be accolade enough, but Chan was determined to repeat the feat in 1988. Johnny Chan won the WSOP Main Event in 1987. Johnny Chan defends his WSOP title in 1988 He is second equal in WSOP bracelets, with 10, and has cashed at the WSOP 45 times. He became respected as one of the very finest players of the 1980s, and is still playing today. In 1981, Johnny Chan earned the nickname “the Orient Express” for defeating all nine players at the final table of the 1981 America Cup poker tournament in under an hour. His parents expected him to follow them into the restaurant business, but he dropped out of studying hotel and restaurant management at 21 to move to Las Vegas with just $300 to his name. Who is Johnny Chan?īorn in China in 1957, Johnny Chan emigrated with his parents to America in 1968. What you may not know is that the hand is based on Johnny Chan’s famous winning hand in the World Series of Poker (WSOP), ten years before. “That son of beech!” explodes the Russian, slamming his cards down on the table.

His bullying Russian opponent (John Malkovich) falls right into his trap, shoving all-in on the river. In the final hand, the young poker prodigy (played by Matt Damon) flops a straight, and decides to slow-play it. One of the best loved and most authentic movies about poker is Rounders (1998).

In the fourth of a 10-part series on the World Series of Poker, the Paul Phua Poker School looks at a winning Main Event hand that was immortalised in the movie Rounders

Movies about poker Rounders