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Welcome to London, Welcome to the Unibet Open
The Unibet Open poker tour, kicking off Season 10, returns to London. The poker festival started yesterday, February 22nd with the eSports and Ambassadors Battle Royale and runs through February 26. The location, as it was last year: The Poker Room above Grosvenor Victoria Casino.
The Unibet Open edition in London is the first festival of 2017 after the hugely successful event in Romania last December which broke all records. Unibet is expecting a big turnout for this the coming event as well, as last year's edition saw 418 players sign up. A total of 11 tournaments are planned, high lighted byt the £900 + £90 Main Event and the two-day £2,020 High Roller. A £165 Turbo Bounty tournament, £110 NLH Freeze-out and £330 Unibet Open Deepstack supplement the offering. Four £100 live satellites taking place starting February 20 help people get in even cheaper.
Around 200 players have already qualified for the Main Event online on Unibet Poker. The €2,000 package they received included a Main Event buy-in, hotel accommodation in the Hilton Metropole and €250 toward travel costs. During the Unibet Open Bucharest in December, the organization made a video about the event:
This event promises to be an exciting one. Will Kassouf and Canadian poker pro Griffin Benger are both set to enter and the two have a bit of a history. They were involved in a heated debate deep in the World Series of Poker Main Event last summer. Benger, with aces, eventually busted Kassouf who held kings, but not before a big argument.
Swedish ultra high stakes phenom Viktor "Isildur1" Blom and a slate of Unibet ambassadors are also set to attend. British pro Ian Simpson (the 2013 Irish Open winner and UKIPT London runner-up), Dara O’Kearney and David Lappin from Ireland, Twitch streamers David Vanderheyden and Charlotte van Brabander from Belgium and Espen Uhlen Jorsad from Norway are attending. Also taking part are two-time Unibet Open winner Dan Murariu and Unibet Open Bucharest champion Traian Bostan. Bostan won the Pokerfest.ro Last Longer in Bucharest which resulted in a package for London.
Viktor Blom Joins Battle Royale Action
Coming Feb. 22, the day before Day 1a of the Main Event, Unibet will be bringing together its roster of star eSport gamers and Unibet Ambassadors for a special “Battle Royale.” All nine members of each group will compete against each other to find the "Best Unibet eSport poker player" and the "Best Unibet Ambassador." The eSport Battle starts at 1 p.m. local time, followed by the ambassadors contest at approximately 7 p.m. Swedish high-stakes online legend Blom will be taking part in both.
Both tournaments are £10,000 freerolls with the prize pool split £5,000, £3,000 and £2,000 for the top three in each. Battling on the eSport table willbe Blom, Alan “hotted” Widmann, Sebastian "Forsen" Fors, Thijs "ThijsNL" Molendijk, Craig “onscreen” Shannon, Scott “Sco” McMillan, Sophia “djarii” White, Fabien "kioShiMa" Fiey and James "JZFB" Bardolph.
Unibet Open London live stream
Unibet London will have a live stream running on Twitch throughout the five-day festival. Commentators Marc Convey and David Vanderheyden will be following the action on the feature table, chatting to special guests in the booth and running competitions and promotions.
Parties
Off the felt, there will be plenty of opportunities for players to have fun. Enjoy welcome drinks Feb. 23 from 8 p.m. to 1 a.m. at the fabulous canal-side Grand Union Bar Paddington, just a stone’s throw from The Poker Room. The eagerly-awaited Unibet Players Party is Feb. 25 from 11 p.m. to 3 a.m. at The Loop Bar in Mayfair, one of London’s most exciting party venues.
“We’re thrilled to be returning to London this month with a very exciting festival planned at The Poker Room," Nataly Sopacuaperu, Unibet Open’s head of events and sponsorship, said. "We look forward to welcoming hundreds of players to the UK capital. Unibet London is a great opportunity for our players to experience high quality poker in a fantastic tourist location with plenty of culture.”
Unibet Open London History
Last year there were 418 entries with British pro David Shallow taking it down for £62,000. There were 55 players in all who got a share of the £313,500 prize pool. The Main Event victory marked Shallow’s third biggest win; he also won the World Poker Tour Dublin Main Event for €222,280 in 2012 and the UKIPT Nottingham High Roller in 2014 for £68,000. Among others who cashed were French poker pro Nicolas Cardyn, who was third, ex-Irish football international Tony Cascarino and Adrien Allain.
| Year | Buy-in | Entries | Prize Pool | Winner | Prize |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2009 | £2,750 | 266 | €584,910 | Thanh Doan | £187,000 |
| 2010 | £1,650 | 273 | £255,000 | Paul Valkenburg | £109,550 |
| 2012 | £1,320 | 315 | £78,000 | Pratik Ghatge | £85,050 |
| 2014 | £1,100 | 399 | £319,200 | Iaron Lightbourne | £70,000 |
| 2016 | £825 | 418 | £313,500 | Dave Shallow | £62,000 |
* Please note that although the Unibet Open has been running since 2007, there were no London events the first two years or in 2011 and 2015.
