Poker Guru Blog

The chances of depriving Kassela of the title of WSOP Player of the Year are close to zero; since his closest rival, John Juanda is out of the Main Event, there are in effect only mathematical odds to beat him.

Frank Kassela

WSOP $10.000 PLH bracelet winner Akos ’Luigi’ Kwaysser (HUN) is contracted by Full Tilt Poker. Luigi made it to Day 3 in the Main Event with 81,900 in chips, already in the colours of his new sponsor.

Akos 'Luigi' Kwaysser

Jack Ury (97) is playing in the WSOP championship the 4th time in a row, beating his own 2009 record of being the oldest player to the race. Ury made it to Day 3 with 8,500 in chips.

Jack Ury

Who couldn't remember the classic scene from the TV show 'Friends' series 01 episode 18, the friends playing poker for the first time? Well, in case you couldn't, or you haven't seen it at all, here is your chance, a nice refreshment on this summer weekend.

Don't forget to check out the rest of the poker scenes - or the whole episode for that matter...

At the Court of Justice in The Hague poker has recently been judged not being a gambling game, according to Dutch laws.

In 2006 commenced a lawsuit in the case of players who were accused of organising illegal gambling, poker to be precise. Despite poker had been considered gambling since 1998, the Court thought it otherwise and dropped the charges.

Advocate Peter Plasman

The model had been set up at the French PokerStars site, and players of PokerStars.com now following suit by planning to paralyze cash game tables this Sunday. The strike is already under planning on 2+2.

As I have mentioned in the post linked above, players at PokerStars.fr have to pay a larger amount of rake, than players at PokerStars.com. Clubpoker organized a strike, and on the 4th July the French players invaded the cash game tables at PokerStars.fr to go on sit-out, thus protesting against the high rake fees. 

Click to enlarge

On the 2+2 forums, another strike is planned to be held, but this time on PokerStars.com. Their main goal is to represent solidarity with the French, although several other goals have been discussed. One of the organizers; ’real fix’, for example, would recommend the following slogan: 

"We cannot keep playing against the French and Italian fish. Please join our global strike!"

The PokerStars.com strike will be held on Sunday, 11th July (4-7 pm GMT). The organizers are requesting the players that choose to join the strike to buy in at ten cash game tables with one tenth of their bankroll (if, for example, we have $1000, we should sit down to 10 NL1000 tables). This is to make sure that the strike does not only affect micro-limit tables. 

As I have mentioned yesterday, the number of World Series Of Poker Main Event participants was an estimated 7,000 players. 

Well, here is how the numbers exactly worked out for this year’s Main Event: 

Day 1a - 1,125

Day 1b - 1,489

Day 1c - 2,314

Day 1d - 2,391

These add up to 7,319, the second largest WSOP player field of all times, the first one being 8,733 players, reached in 2006.

Once again, Phil Hellmuth felt he needed some extra attention when he enters the Main Event of the WSOP, and this year he decided he would dress up as ’The Ultimate Fighter’. Below, you can see his more-than-ridiculous entrance video. I just wonder how UB give their name to such an outright corny act?

There have been several rumors during the WSOP, stating that Liv Boeree and her sponsor, UB.com will stop cooperating. PokerNews Daily, however, has information saying that the two sides are only renegotiating. 

Liv has won the EPT San Remo Main Event, with which she gained a stunning $1.7 million.

Although Liv’s contract with UB has truly expired, according to a UB spokesman they are discussing renewing of the contract. 

“Liv’s contract has expired. We are in contract renegotiation discussions now.” 

2010’s World Championship of Online Poker is scheduled to start on September 5th, with a total of 62 events to be held. 

The opening day of the WCOOP will feature the $215 NLHE Six-Max event, a $10,300 NLHE High Roller Tournament and a $215 Two-Day event. 

The $5,000 Main Event will be held on 26th September at 17:00 ET. 

The tournament schedule basically features all the popular poker variants and buy-in amounts, so that every player will surely find several suitable tournaments to take part in. 

Below, you can find the full preliminary schedule for the 2010 WCOOP:

Online betting company Bwin is to sponsor Italian football league Serie B, from now on running under the name of Serie Bwin.

Former Serie B logo

Pokernewsdaily.com has recently released an interview with WSOP Tournament Director Jack Effel. Besides some advice for beginners and also regarding registration to the latter days, Effel provides insight into the way he and his team deal with the tension of organising WSOP, the ‘Olympics of Poker’. No wonder they confess to tend to get drawn into playing themselves.

Playing poker is tiresome. So why not chill out on the top of Singapore?

The Marina Bay Sands Resort & Casino, opened in June 2010, consists of three 55-stories buldings, four levels of which are dedicated to gambling and card games. The facility, built from around $6 billion(!), of course provides luxury accomodation in its 2560 suites.

As I have hinted earlier, already at the beginning of the WSOP Main Event it was estimated to house over 7,000 participants.

Ilari ‘Ziigmund’ Sahamies, one of the most feared players at online high stakes tables is spending his summer traveling, drinking and thumbing his nose at the WSOP. 

He has now come up with the idea that he would use part of the money he collected at Full Tilt Poker to support the Finnish film industry.

Ilari ‘Ziigmund’ Sahamies

The movie is in the making at the moment, and will tell the story of C.G.E. Mannerheim, the Commander-in-Chief, Marshal and later President of Finland during the second World War. He is celebrated as a national hero for not giving in to the Germans and supporting his citizens at all times.

C.G.E. Mannerheim

The amount of money Ziggy puts into this movie has not yet been declared, but it is for sure, that he will cover at least 10% of the filming costs.

The movie is set to be introduced world-wide in the fall of 2011.