Okay, i'm a hobby/beginner poker player and i regularely play local live freerolls from where i won a 70 EUR tournament ticket. My first live tournament (except the freerolls).

Anyway, i finished 63 out of 111 players and i keep thinking whether i played this hand correctly.

Starting stack: 10 000
Blinds 30 min

We are about 5 hours in.

Current tournament average 13 000ish

Blinds: 200/400 ante 50.
My stack: 9700ish - i managed to get up to 20 000+ but lost half of it a while back.

So, i am in middle position, and i have AJo. UTG raises to 1000 and i call and hijack calls.

FLOP comes like TJ5, two spades with a red J. UTG bets 2000 and now hijack gets ahead of me and reraises to 5000 before his turn. I have already got a read from him - if he bets fast and big means he is weak. So i think for a while and decide to push all in (8700ish). Hijack now calls my all in so does the UTG ( i think he has a weaker J or a straight-draw or something and he calls since he now has good odds).

Turn comes a red blank.

River is an Ace of spades. UTG now pushes all in and hijack calls.
UTG has QJs - spades and wins all, hijack shows T7s - spades.

How did i play this hand? i keep thinking i should have raised preflop but didn't because my M was just around 9 and didn't want to risk my tournament hand with a hand like AJo.

Thank you all in advance.

I would not have 3-bet pre in MP with a UTG raise. In general, that's just asking for trouble and from time to time, you'll win a small pot when everyone folds, but more often than not, you'll fold out the hands you dominate (A10, A9, QJ, KJ, etc.) and only get called by hands that have you crushed (JJ, QQ, AQ, AK). Your call is fine.

On the flop, given the HJ acted out of turn, it really goes to your read of UTG. If you have any inclination that UTG is folding, then I think I would flat, which might in fact persuade the HJ to flat behind. If he does raise, then you can see if UTG calls, and if he does, then I think it's a fold. You ended up in an unlikely scenario here where they both had flush draws. More often one will be on a draw and the other will have a made hand and you have to go upon opponent reads to know how strong of a hand your opponents will play this way.

Let's say on the flop it goes 2,000, call, and HJ decides to call, then UTG checks turn, I'm shoving.

If it goes 2,000, call, raise, and UTG calls, if UTG is tight at all, I'm probably folding. Still given that you started the hand with just over 20 BBs, it's hard to get away from top pair top kicker, so definitely no egregious errors. Nicely played.

Thanks for the answer!

One question though. You wrote "On the flop, given the HJ acted out of turn, it really goes to your read of UTG. If you have any inclination that UTG is folding, then I think I would flat, "

Given, that i only had 8700 behind wouldn't it be a bad idea to call? I would only have 3700 left, and the odds would be even better for the UTG to call.

Probably don't flat pre from these positions unless villain is spectacularly bad but then 3betting will prob > flat if he's that bad.

Agree. As played, I would flat pre instead of raising flop and given your reads on him.