Event #5: £10,350 WSOPE Championship No-Limit Hold'em
Day 1a Started
World Series of Poker Europe 2010
Event #5: £10,350 WSOPE Championship No-Limit Hold'em
Day: 1a
Event Info
Final Results
Event Info
Level Info
World Series of Poker Europe 2010
Buy-in
£10,000
Entries
346
Level
27
Blinds
30,000 / 60,000
Ante
10,000
2010 WSOP Europe Main Event!
Welcome to the start of the 2010 World Series of Poker Europe Main Event! With all of the preliminary events behind us, minus the final day of the £10,350 No-Limit Hold'em High Roller Heads-Up, this is where is all counts.
Last year's champion was Barry Shulman and, although we haven't seen him here in London just yet, he should be on hand to defend his title as most champions are. The runner up was none other than Daniel Negreanu and we all know he's already made the trip having cashed in the Heads-Up event.
What's interesting is that Negreanu's cash in that event puts him at a total of five WSOP Europe cashes in all. Coming into this year's Series in London, he was tied with Chris Bjorin for the most WSOP Europe cashes at four. Bjorin finished in the money in to events and final tabled them both to give him six overall cashes. Negreanu will now need to cash in the Main Event here without Bjorin cashing to tie him for the number one spot once again. For Bjorin, making those two final tables put him ahead of Howard Lederer for the most WSOP Europe final tables. Lederer came into 2010 with three and Bjorin two. Bjorin has already made two this year and now has a total of four. Yeah, we'd say he does well in London.
When it comes to bracelet bets, Tom Dwan and Phil Ivey take the cake. Both of these players have them and this is the last chance for 2010 to claim a bracelet. Ivey came close to another one in the Heads-Up, but went down to Gus Hansen last night after making the final 16. Dwan may have a little bit more on the line than Ivey this year, but it hasn't helped his performances out much. Dwan has yet to even hit the money in an event this year, but that's probably because he's playing to win much more than simply reach the money. It'll be interesting to see if these two waited until the Main Event to collect on their bets.
Along with Ivey, Dwan, Negreanu, Lederer, Hansen and all of the other big names that are here in London, plenty more will be rolling in today and tomorrow to fire it up in the Main Event. Lots of players opted to stop at the World Poker Tour's Borgata event over in the States and are now making their way across the pond to hit up this premier event. Heck, it's going to have a massive prize pool and will be the last chance to win a gold bracelet for 2010.
Don't forget to check out our WSOP Europe Preview article. It's stuffed full of facts and tidbits in order to get you really up to date on the WSOP Europe. All of the important stats are in the article and it will help you to get even more connected to the Main Event.
Play for the Main Event's Day 1a begins at 12:00 p.m. here in London at the Casino at the Empire. Be sure to stick right here on PokerNews and WSOP.com for all the live updates as only our live reporting team can bring it to you. The action will be fast and furious, so don't miss out! We'll see you in a bit.
Take Your Seats
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There is a buzz inside the Empire today, a different buzz than we've seen for the last week.
It's Main Event day here at the WSOPE, and the crowned jewel of the European poker world awaits. It's the diamond-studded gold bracelet that everyone is after this week, the last bracelet of the 2010 World Series.
Tournament Director Jack Effel is on the microphone right now, issuing a few marching orders and inviting players to take their seats. We've already seen a pretty healthy smattering of bracelet winners and other big-name pros in the building today, and our hunch is that it's going to be a great day of poker.
The driving rain outside can't keep the spirits damp inside today. We're less than five minutes away from our starting time, and we should be under way punctually. Sit tight, we'll be right back with the shuffle up and deal.
Seat Open, All Tables
Not in the sense of 'player down' but in the sense that every table is going to be starting (in mere seconds, probably) short handed as latecomers roll in during the sprawling 90 minute first level, or new players step right up to buy in for the full £10,000. In fact, you can still get in if you feel like some deep-stacked tournament poker and the shot at a WSOP bracelet, and the fact that such a high proportion of entrants already have one doesn't put you off...
Level: 1
Blinds: 50/100
Ante: 0
Shuffle Up And Deal!
Inaugural WSOPE Main Event winner Annette Obrestad was given the honours of announcing "Shuffle up and deal!" for day's proceedings and we're off!
Early Table of Death
Just a few feet away from out media desk downstairs on the side of the stage is one of the toughest table in the tournament straight from the start of things. John Juanda, who won the 2008 WSOP Europe Main Event, just sat down to lock horns with Scott Fischman, Brent Roberts, Allen Kessler and Toby Lewis. That's quite the tough table and it'll be interesting to see how it plays out throughout the day.
Wet Wet Wet
Upstairs there are 10 tables, two of which are in the corner along the other side of the balcony, and the other eight in the room adjacent to the bar. There are a number of empty seats (one table has kicked off three-handed), but several familiar faces have taken their seats, all of whom arriving wetter than Marti Pellow as a consequence of the good ol' British weather.
One of those is Annette Obrestad, fresh off announcing "Shuffle up and deal!" downstairs. She's currently playing four-handed with Nicolas Levi, Jason Lester and Chad Brown - not the easiest of starts for the inaugural WSOP Europe champion.
Meanwhile, we are also graced by the presence of Scott Montgomery, Roberto Romanello, Chris Bjorin, Peter Gould, Thomas Bichon, and recent £5,000 Omaha bracelet winner Jeff Lisandro. It's quite the star-studded line-up; Joe Bloggs is nowehere to be seen.
Celebrity Squares
More stars than an entire series of Celebrity Squares up here - Nick Schulman, Faraz Jaka, Huck Seed, Roberto Romanello, David Baker, Ben Roberts, Hoyt Corkins, David Baker and Filippo Candio all hoping for a promising start.
The Crow's Nest
There are two tables separated from the pack up on the far balcony overlooking the main floor. We took a walk up there to see, not surprisingly, two tough tables.
Table 28 is the realm of the onliners as it has Joe "planetearf" Serock sitting to the Dan "KingDan" Smith seated to the immediate right of Kevin "Wu_Wizard" MacPhee in the three and four seats, respectively. They're staring across the table at Dan "KingDan" Smith who occupies the eight seat.
Table 29 has Vanessa Selbst in Seat 5 and Vitaly Lunkin in the eight. As we were standing there, Huck Seed took a seat in the three hole, and Selbst and him struck up a quick conversation. After just a minute, however, Seed realized that his location didn't match his seat draw, and he said, "Hi and bye," and headed off in search of his actual table.
"You'd think after twenty years of poker..." Selbst picked at him as he walked away.