Game is 10/25 HKD so roughly 2/4$

Table is quite loose, not very aggressive, few individuals (hero and villain among the most aggressive)

Villain is an European loose aggressive, big winner in overall and extremely good at reading other players. We've played together several times and I don't think either has an edge over other. I picked my seat to his left to avoid tough spots he puts me in when he has position.
Villains key leak is that he calls too much preflop with bad hands but he can maximise postflop well and compensates this shortcoming.

Hero is generally more TAG, just using my image and playing some speculative hands occasionally with initiative to mix things up.

Both hero and villain bought 5k stack while most of the table runs with 2.5k or 3k, game has run for two hours and no big pots to mention so far from either hero or villain.

Hero opens 68 to 75 from UTG+1
MP calls 75
CO calls 75
Button calls 75
Villain from BB calls 75

Flop: 754 (bingo!)

Villain checks
Hero bets 250
MP, CO and Button folds
Villain check raises to 600
Hero calls 350

Such a dry flop, I have nuts and I think villain might take this line with lot of hands that he tries to get me to fold a cbet. On the other hand I cbet against 5 villains so he should think my range is not very weak either. For a moment I think I should re-pop in here but decide to use my position and mask my hand a bit.

Pot: 1585
Turn card: 5

Villain bets 1200

Now this is where I need some help. My thinking is that if I call this, I need to call also the river bet unless another pair or another 5 comes to board. And if I raise here I'm only getting called by boats so I'm actually very confused on what is the best decision here? I still have strong hand and his check raise doesn't necessarily mean sets.


What should hero do here? What should be the plan for river?

Preflop is meh. If you need to mix it up and force action at a tighter table suited connectors aren't bad hands to do it with, but first you're basically isolating the best player at the table with a highly speculative hand, and second, it doesn't work and you're OOP against three other players in a raised pot with a highly speculative hand.

In hindsight 3-betting the flop seems good, but I like the flat. You are likely way ahead and if v is on some random bluff he has a chance of binking an overcard on the turn and paying you off another bet where as a 3-bet is going to fold out all his air and some of his made hands that he's overplaying. Most turn cards are good for you so not a lot to be afraid of.

The turn is a nightmare. I'm guessing there are no overpairs in his range, no real draws, so he's either got a straight, boat, or air. I think the smart disciplined thing to do is fold the turn. Not sure I could do it in the hat of the moment though.

unless you can read his soul and know he has a set or two pair that boated, i'd call the turn and any river bet.
here, he might just have a 5X - or even a naked 6 hoping to hit a straight.
Heck, he could even be doing this with 7,6.
He's got too many hands including small pps like 88, 66, 99... that he might think are good.

I was actually thinking that his hand range is TT-99 as overpairs, anything larger than JJ he would most likely 3B big pre. (6 combos)
Sets of 77,55,44 are possibility of course but then again he might not always 3B them on such a dry flop. (7 combos on turn)
Any hand that has a 6 is possibility.. 66, A6s, 86s, 76s, 65s, 64s or even 63s (16-20 combos)

So I thought I'm ahead of atleast 2/3 of hands he can possible have on the turn.

As I didn't know what else to do I called the turn

River was J

He bet 1800 on river. River card didn't really change anything.. I don't think JJ was ever in his range. So I called again.

He had 63 flopped straight.

Later talking to him, he said that he thought he is good and was value betting as he thought I'd just check down AA and KK there. And was quite happy he lost a minimum against me when we both hit a straight.. if I had re-raised on flop all would have been in middle.