Poker school
William Shaw says that young boys are running up big gambling debts between classes 'T he game, gentlemen, is
Texas Hold 'Em. Antes are £1. Raise limit: £20.
No table limit. So ...
who's in?' The gaming hall is a large, well-lit, noisy room filled with perhaps 100 people, but only two players are left in the game. Everybody else has folded and the pot stands at £150. On the table lie two jacks, two kings and an ace. The players hold their cards flat down on the table, and scrutinise each other, looking for a 'tell' that will give away their opponent's hand. The betting resumes. Two minutes later, the pot stands at £290, with both players having staked £70 on their respective cards. Then comes the showdown. Player one has two aces — a near unbeatable full house. He waits. Player two flips over his cards: two jacks, which combined with the jacks on the table makes four-of-a-kind. Four-of-a-kind beats full house, but the victor remains impassive. For him, this sum of money is chickenfeed, even though, like me, he is only 17. He gets up from the table, which is stained with pasta sauce and covered with crumbs where others have eaten their school lunches, and walks off to his next class.
In this leading private school in the home counties, large sums of money regularly change hands over the card table. The amount of cash on offer — 100 times most boys' pocket money — is an almost irresistible incentive to start playing, and I was once an enthusiastic addict. Like many of the other boys at the school, I fancied myself as a bit of a card-sharp, but soon discovered that there is a darker side to poker: beneath the exciting surface lie debt, anxiety and quite serious despair. When players should be preparing for ASlevels, they are often worrying about losses at the poker table. Although my debts were negligible compared with those of others, they still caused me to panic, lose concentration and neglect my school work.
What started out as a way to while away free periods in the newly discovered sixthform world — where, to be honest, we have too much time off — quickly became a high rolling game for the brave and foolish. Those who at first hesitated to stake 20p soon found themselves with paper debts running into hundreds of pounds, and what seemed a good way to relax in an increasingly exam-orientated world turned into an extra burden.
As gambling is strictly against school rules, the only way to go undetected when teachers are around is to have no money on the table, so all debts are recorded on pieces of paper. But because there is no actual cash in front of you, it doesn't seem real somehow. It is hard to keep abreast of winnings and losses, and there is no inhibition (such as running out of money) to prevent the gambler playing on and continuing to lose.
The debts have to be paid, however, and so a day and time are arbitrarily decided upon, when all the cash in the 'pot' must be handed over to the winners. It is quite a sight to see a locker filled with all manner of notes and coins — sometimes up to £3,000 — being opened and the money given to one schoolboy.
Some of my fellow players claim that it is just a friendly game and that the money doesn't matter, but this is far from the truth. One boy told me he was afraid of being roughed up. Indeed, one player who is more than £1,000 to the good recently warned other players about his 'three mates who will sort out non-payers'. Several boys owe more than £500, with no immediate way to pay, but reneging on debts is not really an option. Poker is cool because it is 'the gentleman's game' and comes with a code of honour: those who owe, pay or face the consequences for ungentlemanly conduct. This 'noble' mindset, unfortunately, can leave boys with little or no money at a time when they most need it, what with university being only a year away. The world of high-school poker may also have an effect on the long-term future of its participants. The gambling support charity GamCare says that upwards of 7 per cent of first-time callers to its helpline are under 18. Research conducted by Dr Jeffrey Derevensky of the McGill International Centre for Youth Gambling, suggests that most pathological gamblers start playing before the age of 15.
So why is poker back in vogue? I blame films which glamorise the game, such as Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, and endorsement by celebrities such as Ben Affleck, Martin Amis and Ricky Gervais. Young players start because they want to emulate the macho cool of their heroes, then after a few small successes, they are addicted to the 'buzz' of winning — which, in my experience, is more exhilarating the more money there is at stake and the less able you are to afford a big loss. If you do lose, of course, the thought of winning back the cash is also an incentive. One boy in my class lost £200 in a day, and vowed never to play again. However, he was persuaded to try to recover his losses a day later, and after a tentative hour of play he found that his debt had gone up to nearly £500. Luckily his wealthy family could afford to pay out, though he had to lie to his parents about why this money was needed, and so quickly.
Most of the players at my school come from reasonably well-off families — though many of them are by no means rich. When faced with a debt of £700, most teenagers do not have the funds to pay. Several boys are taking up holiday jobs in an effort to earn the money they need, but the main concern of those in debt is generally not the cash, but their parents' reactions if they ever find out.
The government is confident that gambling by young people is not a problem, and Tessa Jowell, the Culture Secretary, has argued that there are enough safeguards to protect children from the gaming industry. I think that this confidence may be misplaced. Signs of addiction are rife at my school. The game is played at every spare moment — between lessons, at break time, at lunchtime. Sometimes people do not even show up at their classes because they are so bound up in attempts to win back a little bit more cash. Nor are high-stakes gambling problems limited to my school. Poker has become an obsession in boys schools across the country. I have several friends at other schools in the London area who play for large amounts of money and have run up big debts in a short time.
At least though, I learnt my lesson during my brief flirtation with this dangerous game. In just six months I lost about £100, which I paid back in small instalments. After which I realised, with relief, that I'm just not good enough at poker, and so I've quit playing.
Previous page
