USA BOUND?

USA BOUND?

By Mick McCloskey

At this time of year many Poker Europa readers will have plans, or will be making plans, for the annual WSOP marathon in Las Vegas. The bracelet events start at the end of May and continue through to the main event in July. Apart from the changes to the actual tournaments this year, there has been an important change made involving your travel arrangements since last year. Since January, anyone travelling to the USA on the visa waiver program, which includes citizens of most European countries, has a new hurdle to clear before they set off on their travels. Anyone intending to travel to the USA is required to complete an online application to enter the country, a few weeks before they travel. The online form is basically the same as the old green form you would normally complete during your journey and hand to the officer at immigration. Details are required regarding your nationality, your passport details and the address you are staying at during your visit to the USA. It also requires you to answer the usual questions about past criminal convictions, links to terrorism, moral turpitude, whatever that is, etc, etc. I have just completed my own application and I can report that the whole process is pretty simple and that I had my application approved straight away. It does state though, that this approval does not guarantee your entry to the USA and the final decision lies with the immigration officer at the point of entry. To complete the application, log onto the ESTA (Electronic System for Travel Authorisation) website at https://esta.cbp.dhs.gov
To everyone heading over to try their luck in Vegas, I wish you all the best of luck and I will, hopefully, be meeting up with friends, old and new, during my own trip. See you there!

IRISH OPEN

The action is all done and dusted for another year and my tournament report can be read in another part of the magazine. The action has also been captured on camera by Win Media Ireland Ltd and condensed into a series of eight one hour shows for television. The first of these shows will be broadcast on the Irish TV channel TG4 at 11.30pm on Wednesday 6th May and every Wednesday night for the following 7 weeks. It is also due to be broadcast in the UK on ITV4, starting on Sunday 17th May at 00.30.

CHARITY

The poker community showed it’s generosity in back to back events in Dublin recently. First, the Fitzwilliam Club hosted a tournament for Touch Ireland and helped to raise €14,000 for that cause. The following weekend, also in Dublin, Boylespoker.com sponsored the Poker for the Homeless March Madness festival at the Jackpot Club. Former Miss World, Rosanna Davidson, broadcaster, Eamonn Dunphy and Snooker legend, Ken Doherty launched the festival on Friday 27th March and helped raise €10,000 for that cause.
Padraig Parkinson, ambassador for Poker for the Homeless said, “It’s fantastic to see such great support for this weekend and we’d like to thank everyone who played and helped organise this weekend.”
Well done to everyone involved in both events.

SHORT HANDED

Green Joker Poker presents the inaugural European Short Handed Poker Championships at the Ballsbridge Hotel, Dublin from 4th to 7th June. All tournaments and cash games will be played 6 handed. The main event has a buy-in of €1,000 + 100, a 20,000 starting stack with 60 minute levels and a €150,000 guaranteed prize pot. Green Joker Poker are currently running online satellites for seats to this event. All side events will also have a 20,000 starting stack. Full details can be found on the Green Joker Poker website.

FINALLY

Congratulations to Martin Silke, from Co. Mayo, on his victory in the £1,500 main event of the Grosvenor UK Poker Tour at the Victoria Casino in London at the end of March. Martin overcame a quality field of 398 to record his first major victory and picked up the top prize of £172,850. It’s just a pity for Martin that the English pound is not worth nearly as much as it used to be but, I’m sure he probably won’t be too bothered by that.

If you have any news, views or events, you can contact me by email to mickymccloskey@hotmail.com

BED AND BREAKFAST

BED AND BREAKFAST

By Mick McCloskey

OK, I’ve got a bone to pick and I’m not really sure who I should approach to get a definitive answer. The two separate organisations involved are the ipoker network and Paddypowerpoker.com. My problem relates to the cost of hotel rooms in the City West Hotel, venue for the upcoming Irish Open. There has been a huge advertising hoarding close to the hotel, on the main N7 route out of Dublin to the South and West of the country, for at least six months. This hoarding is promoting rooms at the hotel from €88 per night, for two people, including breakfast. Various poker sites on the ipoker network have been running satellites for Irish Open packages worth $6,500, which include entry into the main event, worth $4,700, plus $1,000 for expenses and $800 for a room at the hotel for 5 nights. This works out at $160 or around €120 per night for the room. I’m not going to quibble about exchange rates; that’s a whole different ball game which I have touched on before. Let’s just look at room rates. Despite the generally advertised rate of €88, Paddy Power has negotiated a “special rate” for players. According to their website, the room rate is €100 for a single and €115 for a double, no breakfast included. This is a little different from the ipoker package rate, including the packages available on the Paddy Power’s own poker site, of €120, presumably for a double. So, for a start, we have three totally different prices and packages. Now, let’s look at what’s available on the internet as I write this piece, about 4 weeks before the tournament. I have found at least 5 different websites offering a single room, breakfast included, for the Irish Open dates, ranging from €80 to €90 per night. The cost of a twin or double room, breakfast included, ranges from €80 to€100 per night. All these prices are significantly cheaper than those negotiated by Paddy Power or ipoker. Surely, with the number of players expected to stay in the hotel over 5 nights, Paddy Power, or ipoker, should have more than enough purchasing power to negotiate a better rate for its players than the ordinary man in the street can get on numerous internet sites. Apart from all the rooms being sold by the hotel, they must make thousands in profit from food and drink sales and the letting of their function rooms during the Irish Open. Surely they should be welcoming the amount of business they are getting on a holiday weekend in these times of financial uncertainty and should be willing to match their own advertised rate of €88, at the very least.

If anyone from ipoker or Paddy Power wishes to offer an explanation, Poker Europa will be more than happy to publish it.

In the meantime, I would advise anyone who wins a package to arrange their own hotel bookings. If you do, the poker site will give you back the cash for your hotel and you should find yourself with a nice little surplus in your pocket. I managed to get my room at City West for about half of the money I got refunded from my package, a nice little bonus of almost €300 for me.

NEWS

IRISH OPEN

The premier poker event on the Irish calendar kicks off with a €200 re-buy super satellite on 9th April with the main event starting the following day and running until a finish on Monday 13th. A full program of support events is in place, including a closing charity event on the final day.

JP POKER MASTERS

If last year’s experience is anything to go by, this tournament is a must play event. The structure is about as good as it gets for a €750 (75 reg. included) event with a 15,000 starting stack, 60 minute blinds for 10 levels, increasing to 90 minute levels after that. Sponsored by Brucepoker.com, the action kicks off on Thursday 7th May in the Red Cow Hotel, Dublin, with a €75 + 10 super satellite with 2 re-buys or 1 re-buy and a top up for €50 each. There is a full program of support events over the weekend. The main event has a guaranteed €100,000 prize pool. Full details can be found at www.jppoker.ie

GREEN JOKER SHORT HANDED

For the short handed specialists, Green Joker Poker is running a series of events from 4th to 7th June at the Ballsbridge Inn, Dublin. The main event is a €1,000 + 100 freeze-out with a 20,000 starting stack and 60 minute levels. The prize pot is a guaranteed €150,000. All tables, including cash games will be 6 handed. Full details can be found on The Green Joker Poker website.

BOYLES

Boylesports have been very active on the Irish poker scene since Paul Spillane took over the reins running the poker side of the business. They have taken on a number of players on various sponsorship deals including Irish stars Marty Smyth and Padraig Parkinson. I’ve also seen a number of English based players sporting their logo. The latest of these appears to be “Mr. Cool” Marc Goodwin, who topped the European rankings in 2008. We can expect to see Marc playing more events in Ireland in future.

If you have any news, views or events, you can contact me by email to mickymccloskey@hotmail.com

CHARITY

CHARITY

By Mick McCloskey

Poker tournaments have for a long time been a way of raising funds for various charities and community projects throughout Ireland. Indeed, when I first started playing tournament poker, back in the pre internet dark ages, the only tournaments available in my part of the world, were organised mostly by sporting, community or charitable groups as a way of raising funds for various projects. The game in those days was mostly 5 Card Stud in the North of the country and 5 Card Draw Poker in the rest of Ireland. Such local events exist to this day, now mostly playing Hold’em, and a lot of the major events in Ireland now have a charity tournament included, due largely to the fund raising efforts of Padraig Parkinson and Eamonn Connolly. It is a great credit to the organisers and players involved and I’m sure their generosity is fully appreciated by the beneficiaries of these events.

Players will have a further chance to show their charitable sides this month, with the opportunity to win significant prizes for themselves in the process. One of the biggest buy in charity events yet is scheduled to take place in Dublin’s Fitzwilliam Club on 21st and 22nd March. The action is due to get underway at 4pm on Saturday 21st. The buy in is €500 + 50 of which €100 from each player goes direct to the designated charity, TOUCH Ireland, and €400 goes into the prize pool.

The Poker community in Ireland can now play their part in helping the valuable work of TOUCH Ireland. Over the last 6 years they have been responsible for building residential centres, schools, health and support centres in Zambia, Cameroon, India and Sri Lanka. 100% of the funds raised by TOUCH Ireland go directly to the source of these projects. Specifically, TOUCH is looking to raise funds in 2009 to buy a pick up truck which is essential to continue the building programme for 2 schools in Lusaka, Zambia.

So, as there is really not much happening in Ireland this month as regards major ranking tournaments, this is a great opportunity for players to get involved in a big buy in event and to feel good about themselves, whatever the outcome. So get yourselves to the Fitz on the 21st and do your bit for a worthy cause. Full details can be found on the Fitzwilliam Card Club website.

NEWS

Dealer Co-Coordinator, Danielle Paynter has set up a database of poker dealers in Ireland and can organise and supply dealers for events of any size, as well as actually organising dealer shifts and tables during the event itself.
If you are organising a poker event or wish to work as a dealer, Danielle can be contacted by email to danielledealers@gmail.com or by phone in Ireland at 087 235 0256 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting 087 235 0256 end_of_the_skype_highlighting or in the UK at 07775 844481

IRISH OPEN

Ireland’s premier poker event is fast approaching and live satellites for seats are currently being organised in clubs throughout Ireland and, no doubt, further afield as well. Paddy Power, the event sponsors, are running a special promotion for players who qualify on their online site, in the form of a €100,000 value package for the longest lasting qualifier. Sounds like a great last longer bet to me.
For players who do not qualify, Paddy Power has launched an online registration service through the www.irishpokeropen.com website for all events over the Easter weekend at Dublin’s City West Hotel.
A Paddy Power rep tells me that players will have free tea, coffee and bottled water available over the weekend. These items can be expensive in many Irish hotel poker event venues and will, no doubt, be well appreciated by the players.

J P POKER MASTERS

This event, sponsored by Bruce Poker.com, has been announced for 7th to 10th May at the Red Cow Hotel, Dublin. The €100,000 guaranteed main event has a buy in of€750 (reg. included) and a full schedule of support events is in place. For full details log onto www.jppoker.ie

SHORT HANDED

For 6 handed play specialists, Green Joker Poker has announced the European Short Handed Poker Championship, to be held at the Ballsbridge Inn, Dublin, from 4th to 7th June. The €1,000 + 100 main event has a guaranteed €150,000 prize pool. For full details, check out the Green Joker Poker website.

If you have any news views or events, you can contact me by email to mickymccloskey@hotmail.com

THE GOOD, THE BAD AND THE UGLY

THE GOOD, THE BAD AND THE UGLY

By Mick McCloskey

The good.
I spent the first weekend of 2009 in Galway at the Party Poker Irish Poker Championship. Although the numbers were down a little from last year, probably a sign of things to come in these times of economic uncertainty, the organisers really put on a show which they can be proud of. The venue was first class as was the poker room and the nightly buffet in the hotel’s main restaurant. In addition, they laid on a players party the night before the main event and the party atmosphere continued every night of the festival with a rock band playing and the bar remaining open well into the wee small hours. There were also regular guest performers, such as the Devilfish and American Kenna James, in action most nights. The TV feature table was placed in a set made up to look like a typical Irish pub. Recordings from the tournament are already being shown in a series being screened on Sunday nights by Irish broadcaster RTE and will be shown later, via satellite and cable channels, on ITV4.

The bad,
Well, I managed to get busted out of the main event fairly early when I ran my pocket Queens into 5, 7 and then lost the rest of my stack when I flopped top two pair and ran into a set. So I decided to have a night out in Galway with a friend to try to cheer myself up. After walking through the town centre for at least 45 minutes, looking for a Chinese restaurant, we eventually found what must rank as the worst one in the whole of County Galway never mind the city. It advertised itself as a restaurant but it was really more of a semi store room with a couple of tables, behind the take away. The food was actually quite good but we were alone in the place for the duration of our visit, apart that is from the cooks walking through every time they had a takeaway order ready. On the way back, we found that we had walked right past what looked to be a really good Chinese restaurant, doh! Trouble was, it was situated upstairs on the 1st floor and had only a small entrance on the ground floor. So anyway, we were looking for a pub with some music on the way back but the first few places we found were totally packed out. We eventually found one with a bit of space and somewhere to sit. Unfortunately, the singer/ guitar player, with a drum/rhythm machine for backing, didn’t have a note in his head and we discovered we had also found, probably the worst music pub in Galway! It just wasn’t my day.

The ugly.
Most poker players in Ireland will probably have heard about the discrepancy in the chip counts on day two of the main event. It appears that, at least one player had managed to get his hands on and introduce some high denomination chips into the tournament. It was discovered that there were around 135,000 more chips in play than there should have been. The tournament was suspended while an investigation was carried out. The suspicion, rightly or wrongly, fell on one particular player but, unfortunately, there was not enough evidence to be 100% sure that this player was involved and should be asked to leave the tournament. While the physical security of the tournament chips seems to have been compromised, it is really disgusting that whoever was responsible for introducing the chips seems to have gotten away with it.

Poker tournaments in Ireland have rightly earned an excellent reputation over the last few years and it would be a real shame if this reputation was to be damaged by the despicable actions of one individual. The timing could not really have been worse, with player numbers seeming to be falling due to economic conditions. Let’s hope that this unsavoury incident does not damage future events. Tournament organisers must do all in their power to ensure that lessons are learned and that there is no possibility of a repeat episode of this sort.

They say that every cloud has a silver lining. Because of the situation, the organisers decided to donate €28,000, the approximate cash value of the extra chips discovered to be in play, to Padraig Parkinson’s Charity tournament for the homeless. Players who played in the main event were able to play the charity tournament for €100 instead of the advertised €330. Around €60,000 was raised for the nominated charities.

NEWS

After the glut of tournaments at the end of 2008, there seem to be no major events in the pipeline right now for February and March. By the time you read this, the European Deep stacks event in Dublin will probably be done and dusted.

The next major event on the horizon is, of course, the Paddy Power Irish Open, being held over Easter weekend at the City West Hotel on the outskirts of Dublin. Satellites for seats and hotel and travel packages are currently running on various internet poker sites. Paddy Power’s own site are running a promotion for their online qualifiers which has a €100,000 value prize for the last man standing in the main event, made up of cash and tournament entries. Happily I have already qualified for this. What am I going to do with myself on Sunday evenings between now and Easter?
Paddy Power.com has also announced that online registration is now available through their Irish Open website.

Roy “The Boy” Brindley has been in touch to let me know that his autobiography, entitled “Life’s a Gamble” is being published and will go on sale in all major book stores on 26th February.

If you have any news, views or events, you can contact me by email to mickymccloskey@hotmail.com

DUPLICATION

DUPLICATION

By Mick McCloskey

Over the last three months of the year just passed there has been a real glut of major poker tournaments taking place around Ireland. While all this action is to be welcomed, a few of these events clashed with each other. Ireland is not really a big enough country for two tournaments to clash without both suffering in terms of numbers. I have been talking to a number of people about this situation and the general feeling seems to be that too many clashes are taking place and that organisers should be more diligent in trying to ensure these do not happen. Obviously, there are certain traditional dates in the poker calendar which are well known for hosting major poker events. These dates are more or less sacrosanct and it would be foolish for any new entrant to mess with them. As regards other newer events competing for a share of the market, I think it makes sense for both organisers and players not to be left in a position of having two, or more major events in the same week.

There are various ways available to organisers to try to avoid clashes. A thread on this subject has been opened on the Irish online forum, boads.ie This site also has a special section available for organisers to list details of their tournaments.
For organisers who wish to run tournaments eligible for European Ranking status, full details of the criteria necessary for ranking status, as well as an up to date list of ranking events, can be found on the website, pokerineurope.com. This site operates in conjunction with Poker Europa magazine in trying to keep up to date listings both online and in print.

Another useful tool available to organisers and players alike is the Hendon Mob data base which lists all poker tournaments worldwide as well as having the facility to break down the lists to look at tournaments by country, by region or by continent.

Finally, I endeavour to keep an up to date list of major Irish tournaments on my own website and am always happy for organisers to get in touch with me with details of their events.

These are just a few of the methods which tournament organisers can use. Unfortunately not all organisers make the effort to use the resources available to them to publicise their events. If they did, there would be less duplication.

NEWS

Celtic Poker Tour are set to hold their Grand Final in the Clonmel Park Hotel from 16th to 18th January. The main event has a guaranteed prize pool of €100,000 and costs €500 + 50 to enter with one re-buy or top up available at €200. Also running over the weekend is a super satellite and a €150 + 20 support event.

Cue Club Events, in conjunction with Bruce Poker.com, present the Lakes of Killarney Hold’em Festival from 29th January to 1st February. The sponsors, BrucePoker.com are adding €5,000 to the prize pool of the €500 + 50 main event which will feature a 15,000 starting stack and 60 minute levels The main event is scheduled to run for three days. The festival includes a super satellite, a two day support event priced at €300 and a final freeze-out costing €170. For further details, email cueclub@eircom.net

European Deepstack Poker Championship II

Green Joker Poker has announced details of the second running of their Deepstack event. It will take place in the Green Isle Hotel, Dublin, from 5th to 8th of February. The three day main event has a buy-in of €1,500 +150 and features a huge 50,000 starting stack with a 60 minute clock and a slow structure starting with the usual 25/50 level. Only 250 seats are being made available for this event so deep stack fans would be advised to book early. This year there will be one starting day for all players on Friday 6th February. The festival includes a super satellite on 5th February and two support events priced at €500 + 50 and €300 + 30. All the events will be run under the control of the excellent J.P. McCann and his team. Online satellites are currently underway and full details of qualifiers and of the Festival can be found on the Green Joker Poker website.

IRISH OPEN

Qualifying satellites for this Easter’s Irish Open continue on Paddypowerpoker.com and qualifiers can look forward to being included in Paddy Powers last longer promotion, which will be worth a juicy €100,000 to the winner in cash and tournament entries. As we go to press, it has just been announced that, as forecast in my last column, the venue for the Irish Open will indeed be Dublin’s City West Hotel. You heard it here first.

CONGRATULATIONS

Congratulations to the latest Irish player to have a big poker pay day. Irish poker legend Donnacha O’Dea’s son, Eoghan took down the main event of the European Championship of Online Poker, playing on Paddy Power.com He defeated a field of 1,282 players in this $1,060 buy-in event to walk off with the first prize of $315,000. Perhaps Eoghan can now come out from under the shadow of his famous father and claim his own place in Irish poker’s elite.
If you have any news, views or events you can contact me by email to mickymccloskey@hotmail.com

SHORTCHANGED

SHORTCHANGED

By Mick McCloskey

I think I have been.
I recently won a package online for the Paddy Power Irish Winter Festival in Dublin. The package, valued at $4,500, was played on the iPoker network through Green Joker Poker, whose banking and customer services are provided by Bluesqpoker.com. I have won a number of tournament packages on this site before, mostly for entries to GUKPT events, and have never had a problem with these. The GUKPT packages were normally valued at $2,500 and covered the tournament entry and the balance was credited to my account to cover expenses. The tournament entry was paid using the exchange rate on the day of the online satellite, which I believe is standard practice at Bluesq for GUKPT events.

On the other hand, the IWF package included four nights’ hotel accommodation as well as expenses. As I had made my own hotel arrangements, I informed the poker site of this fact. Subsequently my account was credited with the sum of $1,050 for expenses and $620 for the hotel. At the same time as this was going on, Paddy Power were running satellites on their own poker site for a seat only for the IWF. This seat was valued at $2,222. If you add up the seat, 2,222 + expenses 1,050 + hotel 620 the total comes to $3,892, some $608 short of the $4,500 advertised value of the package. I emailed my sums to Bluesq and awaited their explanation. I was told that the iPoker network had purchased the seats in advance at a different exchange rate, costing them $2,600. I was also told by Bluesq that, “due to a human error in the communication between us and iPoker” my hotel refund should have been $725 rather than the £620 they had given me. They also informed me that they had deducted $100 from my winnings for a qualifiers welcome party, which they had failed to invite me too. Having refunded the hotel shortfall and the welcome party fee, this still left a $25 difference. I was informed that this related to “a deduction as a network “ buffer” for European packages currency rate variance at the point of transaction.” whatever that means. Considering that I am the one who feel he has suffered due to the “currency rate variance” they have a hell of a cheek in deducting $25 from my package to cover themselves!

At the end of the day, this is not even their own money that they are dealing with. It is all players’ money. The site/network provided a platform for the players on the night of the satellite, for which they charge a fee to each player. Never mind the numbers, the whole thing was handled in a totally sloppy manner, leaving a bad taste in the mouth. This is not just a personal matter as there were quite a number of online qualifiers for this event on various sites across the network. I would advise all of them to check how much they actually got for their so called $4,500 package.

For my own information and on behalf of any readers who may also be affected or concerned with this matter, I posed a number of questions to the site/network. The questions and any answers I got were as follows:-

1) How many other players were affected by this issue? – No reply.
2) If the exchange rate had gone the other way and the network had bought seats in advance for, say, $2,200, would the network pass the savings onto the satellite winners?
3) If not, who benefits from any exchange rate surplus?
4) How does the network work out how many seats/hotel rooms to purchase in advance?
5) If they purchase too many seats, do they get a refund on the surplus? If not, why purchase them in advance anyway?
6)If they purchase too few, do they buy any additional seats at a new exchange rate or the original rate?
7) Do they actually pay for hotel rooms in advance or do they merely book the same number of rooms as the number of seats they purchase?

As regards the purchase of seats, they gave no details of the mechanics save to say that “iPoker pay the rate on the day of purchase.” As regards the hotel rooms they said “iPoker do not disclose their dealings with hotels.” I would doubt very much that they would pay for hotel rooms in advance and would probably have benefited from the rise in the value of the dollar against the Euro from the time the hotel rate was agreed to the time of the event itself.

They did say that “in both instances iPoker do not make a profit or loss as they pay the correct rate on the day of purchase – there is no currency surplus as you suggest. In fact, they would be exposed to currency fluctuations and potentially suffer losses if they bought packages at the end of the promotion – if the value of the $USD went down against the event currency.”
They continued “The only apparent way to resolve the situation you faced would be to reconcile the packages on a weekly basis; however iPoker are currently unable to do this as there is excessive administration and paperwork involved in transferring such amounts of money to external providers.” Not sure if this a valid excuse as there are only a handful of qualifiers each Sunday night and it should be no big deal, in the age of instant communications and cash transfers, to deal with the admin. weekly.

They concluded by telling me “they will consider splitting the reconciliation twice during a single promotion.” They are also “currently developing “multi currency” functionality for 2009 which means players will actually play in the currency of different events – resolving this issue.” Well thank goodness for that and the fact that they do admit that there is an issue.

While they are developing their new system, I think I will play for tournament seats directly on the sponsors own sites rather than through a third party who can blind me with currency fluctuation excuses.

I would advise anyone who wins tournament packages online to check the figures carefully to make sure they are getting what they are supposed to.

RESPECT

RESPECT

By Mick McCloskey

A group of elderly poker players were playing their regular weekend game when Dick loses £1,000, an unusually large amount for this game, on a single hand, clutches his chest, and drops dead at the table.

Showing due regard for their fallen comrade, the other players continue playing, but standing up instead of sitting, as a mark of respect to their friend.

At the end of the game, Tom looks around and asks, “So, who's gonna tell his wife?”

They cut the cards. Harry picks the low card and has to carry the news.

They tell him to be discreet, be gentle, don't make a bad situation any worse.

“Discreet? I'm the most discreet person you'll ever meet. Discretion is my middle name. Leave it to me.”

Harry goes over to the Dick’s house and knocks on the door. The wife answers through the door and asks what he wants?

Harry declares: “Your husband just lost £1,000 in a poker game and is afraid to come home.”

“Tell him to drop dead!” yells the wife.

“I'll go tell him.” says Harry.
____________________________________

NEWS

The last three months of 2008 were/are bursting at the seams with good tournaments in Ireland. Unfortunately, some are going to suffer numberwise due to date clashes.

IRISH POKER CHAMPIOSHIP

One that probably won’t have this problem is the Party Poker Irish Poker Championship, the first major European tournament of 2009. The festival kicks off with a super satellite in the Eglinton Casino, Galway, on Thursday 1st January. The action then moves to the Radisson Hotel for the €2,000 three day main event starting on Friday 2nd. Support events will run on the Saturday and Sunday, including a charity event, organised by Padraig Parkinson, in aid of the homeless. If last year is anything to go by, this should be a great weekend with plenty of visitors from the UK, Europe and the USA. The events of the weekend will be recorded for a series of eight TV shows, initially, I understand, for Irish broadcaster RTE and later for more general release. The last of the IPC Tour events, for seats and cash, will take place in the Gold Club Casino, Letterkenny, Co. Donegal from 4th to 6th December and then from 12th to 14th December in the Red Cow Hotel, Dublin. For full details check out www.pokerevents.ie

OTHER NEWS

Wexford’s Quay Casino are putting on their first major festival over first weekend in December from 4th to 7th.The three day main event has a €1,000 entry fee. Full details can be found at www.quaycasino.com

Other new entrants to the major tournament scene include the Emerald Casino, Dundalk, who will host The North of Ireland Masters from 12th to 14th December. The main event has a €500 + 50 entry fee. Check out the Emerald Casino website for full details.

Another new entry is the grandly titled Leprechaun European Poker Open due to be held in the Crown Plaza Hotel, Northwood, near Dublin Airport, from 27th to 29th December. The main event buy-in is a modest 275 dollars (inc. reg.) but the event has a 50,000 Euro guaranteed prize pool. Registration is online only at www.leprechaunpoker.com Special room rates have been negotiated and can be booked, using “leprechaun poker” as the promotion code at the four star Crown Plaza. The rates are €85 for a single room or €95 for a double. Rooms at the nearby three star Express by Holiday Inn are available for €69 per night.

2009

Tournaments already announced for next year include the Lakes of Killarney Hold’em Festival in the Killarney Heights Hotel from 29th January to 1st February. Organised by Cue Club Events in conjunction with Bruce Poker.com, the main event has a buy-in of €500 + 50.

The second European Deep Stack Poker Championship is scheduled for 5th to 8th February in the Green Isle Hotel, Dublin. The main event buy-in is €1,500 + 150, up from €1,400 + 100 last year. There will be one starting day for all players this time instead of the two day start which operated in 2008. Full details can be found at Green Joker Poker’s website.

IRISH OPEN

Paddy Power Poker has announced the dates for the 2009 Open as 9th to 13th April. The main event buy-in has been reduced to €3,200 + 300. The venue is yet to be confirmed but it seems likely that it will again be held in the City West Hotel, Dublin. Online qualifiers are already running and Paddy Power has announced that the longest lasting qualifier from their poker site will win a €100,000 package made up of tournament entries and cash. Full details can be found on the paddypowerpoker.com website.

IRISH TEAM VICTORY

Congratulations to non playing captain, Len Collin and his Irish team on their recent victory in Brighton in the APAT European Team Championship.

Finally, I just want to take this opportunity to wish all Poker Europa readers best wishes for the Christmas holiday season and a peaceful and profitable poker new year.

If you have any news, views or events, you can contact me by email to mickymccloskey@hotmail.com