Yorky Pud

The 2004 World Series of Poker Main Event Champion, Greg "Fossilman" Raymer, was in court on Tuesday but thankfully he was not being accused of any wrong doing, instead he was giving evidence as a star witness in an attempt to overturn a ruling that made poker halls illegal in the state of Virginia.

Raymer was called upon by the Poker Players Alliance in an attempt to help the case of Charles Daniels, a businessman from Portsmouth, Virginia, who between 2006 and 2010 had run a a number of successful poker hall in Portsmouth. Along with being extremely popular with poker players, the tournaments and cash games held in the halls were also used to raise money for charity and Daniels revealed that almost 75% of the halls' revenues, or around $700,000, had been donated to local charities in the four years he had run the poker halls.

Clampdown After Four Years

But in 2010 Portsmouth's Commonwealth Attorney, a Mr Earle C. Mobley decided to bring the curtain down on Charles' operation, despite having let it run for almost half a decade without any interference whatsoever. Mobley's excuse was the state's gambling laws had previously had a lot of grey areas in them but now they were clear and he did not want Portsmouth to become a gambling centre. Gambling on games of chance is illegal in the state of Virginia.

Charles asked the Poker Players Alliance for help and they thought that Greg Raymer, who has long been a great ambassador of the game, would be the perfect person for the job. Raymer, who has over $7,000,000 in lifetime winnings from live poker tournaments, spent a quarter of an hour trying to convince Judge Thomas Shadrick that to win at poker players had to develop skills and strategies and could manipulate situations to benefit themselves and reduce their opponent's chances of winning.

Bingo And Lotteries Are Not Gambling?

The gambling laws in Virginia define illegal gambling as when someone stakes something of value for a chance to win something of value in a contest, the outcome of which is uncertain or a matter of chance." Ironically, the state of Virginia has a state-run lottery which is 100% pure chance and they also allow bingo parlours, one of which Daniels owns, but for now there will be no legal poker halls in Virginia.

Judge Shadrick ruled in favour of Mr Mobley despite the fact he agreed that poker had an element of skill to it. However, although he conceded this fact he also said that the evidence provided by Charles' team, including that give by Raymer, indicated that the better players stand a better players will win more over time, the same evidence actually showed that the outcome of each hand is still uncertain.

At time of writing Daniels had not indicated whether or not he was planning on launching an appeal against the decision.

Join Betfair Poker Now!

Poker, both live and online, is perfectly legal in the United Kingdom and all the areas where Betfair Poker operate. We have always acted within the laws set out by each territory. If and when a situation changes, we will inform the affected customers immediately, but until then enjoy playing on a 100% safe online poker site.

In a day an age where there seems to be a $10,000 buy-in live poker tournament at least once a month, often more than that if the players are prepared to travel around on the various tours, it is no surprise that the popularity of staking is at an all-time high. Most deals never hit the headlines but imagine if you had a large piece of Pius Heinz and he went on to win the World Series of Poker Main Event, which is exactly what happened to the Pokeroff website.

Poker is full of stories of people buying percentages of each other, it is just part of the game but the people behind Pokeroff seem to have a unique ability of staking the biggest winners in poker at just the right time. In recent times they have had pieces of EPT London Champion David Vamplew, PCA Main Event winner Galen Hall, EPT Berlin Champ Benjamin Wilinofsky, WSOP bracelet winner Joe Ebanks and the crowning jewel in their staking operations, the newly crowned WSOP Main Event Champion Pius Heinz!

So who are Pokeroff? One of the people heavily involved in the community and someone who played in the Betfair Poker LIVE Kiev tournament last year, is named Max Katz and he took some time out of his busy schedule to talk a little about Pokeroff, why there are so many Russian's in European poker tournaments and how big staking is right now in live poker.

Matthew Pitt: Could you tell our readers what Pokeroff is?

Max Katz: I have been part of Pokeroff ever since the founder Andrei Doktoroff built the site around seven years ago. Pokeroff is the biggest Russian site related to poker and it is written in the style of a blog. We do not have many articles written by hired staff or journalists, most the content is made by players and people who write poker blogs.

MP: Is a major part of the Pokeroff community dedicated to staking other players or buying percentages of players who are entering bigger buy-in tournaments?

MK: Yes. We have a closed community inside Pokeroff that people can participate in and they can buy shares of players who are wanting to sell some action. We also actively look for people who are wanting to sell shares, then we publish the offer on the private website and it is divided between the people who want a share of that particular player.

MP: It was rumoured that Pokeroff staked around $1,000,000 worth of tournament entries at the recent World Series of Poker. Is this an exaggeration or is that amount of money regularly been exchanged?

MK: Actually we staked more! Actually much more! We had a total of 170 players and they played in 2,915 events between them and we had shares in three bracelet winners including the Main Event, Joe Ebanks and Amir Lehavot. And we also had some big successes before the series, at the PCA Galen Hall, we had a share in Ben Wilinofsky at EPT Berlin and David Vamplew at EPT London and some third places at EPTs, we've had a lot of success.

MP: With Pokeroff being Russian facing I would have thought you may have only stakes Russian poker players, but it appears that is certainly not the case and that you have cast your net far and wide.

MK: We actually mostly stake non-Russian players because the foreign players are usually better and offer better conditions. In Russia the staking market is already very developed, there are a lot of potential buyers but not all of them know how to choose the right offers. The staking market in Russia is very good.

MP: Poker seems very popular in Russia and the neighbouring countries if the European Poker Tour is a gauge. Everytime I look at the entrants there are a lot of Russian and Ukrainian players amongst the entrants.

MK: This is not because poker is popular but because staking is popular. There are a lot of possibilities to find a stake in Russia, there are companies who will stake players and places where you can sell offers publicly. In Russia it is all very developed so this is the main reason there are a lot of Russian players in European poker tournaments

MP: Well that clears that one up! About Pius Heinz, I was told he sold a large percentage to a number of Pokeroff members (I actually quoted a percentage but Max declined to confirm)

MK: Actually I cannot say the exact number and I would prefer for you to publish rumours, because we like to keep the exact number secret, but yes we had a big share of Pius.

MP: Was he introduced to you? How did you come about knowing him?

MK: We have a site where players can publish offer on. We do not advertise this site, we just give the address to players we know and they give it to good players they know so it is like a recommendation. Somebody recommended Pius, he published an offer on the site, at first it was only a offers for small events at the WSOP for like the $1,000 and $1,500 tournaments and we bought them. Then he won seventh or eighth place in one of the $1,500 events, then he decided he wanted to sell more shares in the Main Event and we agreed.

MP: It will go without saying staking Pius Heinz is the best result for Pokeroff.

MK: Yes of course! Obviously! It is one of the largest poker tournaments in history of poker, but we have had other results like Galen Hall that were also very good.

So there you have it, the key to staking success. All you have to do to become staked by Pokeroff is to first be very good at poker and have the results online or live to prove this, then hope somebody recognises you and gives you a recommendation for this private staking website! One thing is for certain Pokeroff seem to have the golden touch when it comes to selecting who they buy shares of in the poker world.

There are those who say that the game of football brings people together and there are those that feel the same way about music but for me the game of poker is without a doubt one of the best ways to meet new people, experience different cultures and make friends who you will know for life.

Poker has been very kind to me in that it is allowed me to forge a career out of the game. Admittedly, I would rather be making a career by being a professional poker player but that is quite unlikely to happen so I have made a career out of following professional poker players.

During the last 12 months I have been fortunate enough to travel to Barcelona, Prague, a ski resort in Austria, Slovenia, Tallinn, Paris, Cannes and more recently Amneville all through working on the European Poker Tour and World Poker Tour, something that I am very grateful for because I have met some amazing people and hope to continue meeting them in future months and possibly years.

Last week I was in Amneville for a World Poker Tour event and on one of the nights the blogging team decided to give the free buffet a miss and try one of the restaurants in the complex. After going to two places that were completely rammed we settled on a little Mexican joint so the five of us sat down. This all seems pretty standard but in what other job would I be seated with such a wide variety of different characters from around the world, with different views and opinions who I have know for such a little time but still all get on like a house on fire? The four others were Lee Davy, Marko Saric, Tomaso Vimercati and Francesco Rizzo. Just from the names you can tell we were a pretty cosmopolitan group and just from our personalities this situation would never naturally happen but thanks to poker it did. We ate our food, had some drinks and took the piss out of each other and had a great time.

The camaraderie also spreads to other bloggers and tournament staff too. There are the same familiar faces at most stops of the various tours and you quickly become friends with them too, even if some of them speak as much English as I do Italian, Spanish or French. Working for 12-14 hours a day for a week, eating with them and socialising with them means you quickly learn a lot about each other and even if you do not get to speak to some of them there is a mutual respect because you are all working your balls off to produce a good product.

Then there are the players themselves, there are some great people on the tour. I get to regularly chat and hang out with people who I would only ever see on TV. I have discussed poker with a World Series of Poker bracelet winner, become friends with an EPT and WPT winner in the shape of Roberto Romanello and even James Akenhead knows who I am! This may sound like a Phil Hellmuth tweet with me dropping names but these are poker players that many look up to, players who I have written about and watched on TV and now players who I know.

Watching people go through the rollercoaster ride caused by the mixture of luck and skill is an amazing experience. Throughout a tournament you get to see bad beats develop, watch future stars run massive bluffs and there is always a champion. Watching an emotional Romanello lift the trophy when he won EPT Prague was a fantastic experience and I can say I was there when he won it. At WPT Amneville I saw Adrien Allain, who is definitely a star in the making, win his first WPT title and €310,000+. Seeing his face as his pocket tens held and the pure joy and elation as he dived into the crowd of his friends was special and I would be lying if I said it wasn't a goosebump moment.

I'm not sure why I am writing this blog post but there again I rarely plan anything I write so it must just be something that was in my head. I guess I would like to say thanks to everyone I have met on the various poker tours, including the names above, for helping to make working on the circuit such a pleasurable experience and making it nothing like work. I sometimes pinch myself because I cannot believe I get paid for doing it! Working away from home is very difficult because I miss the Mrs, my kids and the creature comforts of home but the people on the circuit are like a second family, a part-time family if you like, that I meet up with once a month but although they become my family on a part time basis, they will be my friends forever.

Authorities in the United States of America have closed down a bank, with immediate effect, that was heavily linked to "Black Friday." The SunFirst Bank, based in Utah, was shut down last week by state regulators but has since re-opened under new ownership, calling itself Cache Valley Bank.

According to reports in the U.S, SunFirst Bank had been experiencing severe financial problems and had lost around $2,700,000 in the first six months of 2011, which made it an attractive option for American-facing online poker sites such as PokerStars and Full Tilt Poker to approach. It has been widely reported that PokerStars and Full Tilt Poker had invested in a number of banks in the United States so that they would turn a blind eye to processing funds used for playing online poker, which has been illegal in the US since the passing of the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act (UIGEA) of 2009.

The banks co-owner, John Campos, was one of the 11 men indicted by the American Department of Justice on April 15, now known as Black Friday. The 57-year old was named in six of the nine counts in the indictment that alledged SunFirst Bank processed payment for both PokerStars and Full Tilt Poker.

It is believed that Campos, who pleased not guilty to any of the charges against him, agreed to process the illegal internet gambling transactions at the request of Chad Elie, a Las Vegas based businessman. Campos allegedly agreed to process these transaction for $20,000 and the promise of a $10,000,000 investment in his ailing bank. Both Campos and Elie were arrested shortly after Black Friday and both released on bail of $25,000 and $250,000 respectively.

Immediately after Black Friday both PokerStars and Full Tilt Poker closed their doors to American customers something that played a major role in the demise of Full Tilt Poker. Although PokerStars had a huge American customer base they also invested heavily in advertising across the globe so their traffic was not as badly hit, plus when the American Department of Justice froze bank accounts connected to PokerStars, they were able to repay their American customers quickly thanks to having segregated accounts for each player.

However, Full Tilt Poker lost a massive percentage of their player pool and it quickly became apparent of a number of financial shortfalls within the company, shortfalls that saw their licence being revoked by the Alderney Gambling Control Commission. Full Tilt Poker has been offline since its licence was initially suspended on June 29 and they are still to repay a single cent to any of their former customers.

Adrien Allain may not be a name you are familiar with but ensure you commit it to memory because this young man is going to go a very long way in the poker world. Two years ago he won his first major title when he took down the 2009 APT Macau Main Event, now he has joined an elite group of players who have won a World Poker Tour title by winning WPT Amneville.

A field of 379 players were left in Allain's wake and he was most deserving of his win, showing dogged determination and controlled aggression throughout the tournament. The French youngster started the six-handed final table second in chips behind American heads-up SNG specialist Scott Baumstein but after two levels of play he found himself second from last in chips and his dreams of becoming a WPT champion looked set to be broken.

However, shortly after the first scheduled break he found himself in a perfect scenario. Baumstein, who had been playing almost every hand, raised preflop with Ah10h and Allain looked down to discover he had been dealt pocket aces. He three-bet shoved all in and Baumstein decided he was prepared to call off more than 950,000 chips, much to the delight of Allain and his legion of fans. The aces held and Allain found himself second in chips again with a stack of two million, allowing him to take on the chip leaders once again and play his usual aggressive game, a style that tormented Phil Hellmuth at the recent World Series of Poker Europe.

It took almost two and a half hours for the first player to be eliminated, Arnaud Trouer being that unfortunate soul and after his departure the table seemed to relax, perhaps now knowing they could not be the first player to bust from the final table. Over the next six and a half hours Trouer was followed to the rail by Michel Konieczny, Scott Baumstein and Thibaud Guenegou, setting up a heads-up battle with fellow countryman Jordane Ouin,a player who had qualified for WPT Amneviile online for a fraction of the €3,500 entry fee.

Both players started almost exactly even in chips but Allain started to apply the pressure straight away and he began to open up a sizeable lead over Ouin but Ouin managed to draw level again with an amazing call. Allain had raised preflop to 170,000 and then called when Ouin three-bet to 570,000. The flop came down 7d-4d-8c, Ouin bet 620,000 only to see Allain move all in. Ouin sat for nearly five full minutes before announcing “call,” and he turned over Ac9c, which was ahead of the JdTs of Allain. The turn and river bricked and Ouin was back level pegging.

Ouin may have taken the lead but everyone thought it was only a matter of time before Allain started to turn the screw again and he began to put some distance between him and his opponent. The key hand saw Allain commit his stack on a Kd-Qd-9c-9d board with 6d5d and Ouin call with Ac9s. The river failed to pair the board and Allain now held a massive 9,370,000 to 2,000,000 chip advantage but even more you could physically see Ouin had all but given up the fight.

Just moments later it was all over. Ouin raised from the button, Allain put him all in and after double checking his cards, Ouin called off his remaining chips with Kh9d. He was up against the TdTs of Allain and when the board ran out 4c-8s-Qd-4s-9s, Ouin was eliminated and Allain was announced as the champion of WPT Amneville.

The next European stop of the WPT is at the start of December in Prague but before then it sets sail for Marrakech and you can bet a certain Adrien Allain will be there attempting to win back-to-back World Poker Tour titles.

Final table results

1st: Adrien Allain: €310,633
2nd: Jordane Ouin: €170,365
3rd: Thibaud Guenegou: €113,580
4th: Scott Baumstein: €80,640
5th: Michel Konieczny: €60,197
6th: Arnaud Trouer: €47,700

Most of the money that you make from No Limit Hold'em cash games will come from the weak players at your table, this should make perfect sense and need little explanation. A common trait shared by weaker players is they play a loose style of poker with little or no starting hand requirements so just how do you combat loose players?

The first thing you need to do when you encounter a loose player is to figure out if they are a weak player or a solid one who chooses to play a loose style. Not all loose players are weak in fact some of the very best players in the world are extremely loose, just look at Tom “durrrr” Dwam Patrik Antonius and Phil Ivey. Each of those three players are very and would certainly not be considered weak by any stretch of the imagination. The difference between these three poker Goliath's and your standard fish is that although they are very loose and maybe even reckless preflop, where the bets are usually small, once the hand progresses onto the flop, turn and river they are extremely tough as they have superior hand reading skills and have the ability to manipulate their opponents.

Many weak players think they are playing a LAG style when all they are doing is setting light to their money. For example, in a $0.50/$1 game with $100 stacks you raise to $4 with 10s10c from middle position and the LAG-wannabe calls in the small blind with Qd3d. The flop comes down 10dKdKs. You bet $6, he check-raises you to $30 and because you know he's completely nuts you move all in. He snap-calls and realises he is drawing dead to all but a miracle. A solid LAG would never get into that position post flop, they may put in the check-raise but once you move all in they would be gone like a shot. Whenever you encounter a loose player do not assume they are a complete fish until you have seen them make one or two major mistakes post-flop when the betting becomes substantial.

Against weak loose players you should make a number of adjustments to your game but be aware these adjustments against solid LAGs would see you ripped apart very quickly indeed. The first is to play them at their own game and loose up your preflop play when this player has already entered the pot. Do not go completely mad and start playing 7s3h but if they have limped in you can safely play more speculative hands than you usually would such as 9c8d, 7d5c and small unsuited aces. If they come in for a raise, particularly if they raise a lot of hands you can probably call with hands as weak as Qd10d, AsJc and all suited connectors and one-gapped suited connectors.

You should also start to value bet weaker hands such as top pair simply because they will pay you off handsomely. Against a tough LAG you are unlikely to win a hand at showdown with just top pair because if they call bets on all three streets then they are usually strong enough to beat top pair. But weak LAGs will often call opponents down with top pair and no kicker or draw to a hand and hit a weak pair and still call you down with it.

Finally, you should try to bluff these players much less than you would a tough player or a tighter player simply for the fact you are likely to get called by a weird and wonderful array of hands by a weak LAG. Do not stop bluffing completely otherwise even weak players will be able to read you easily and exploit you but try to keep the big daring bluffs for a more suitable candidate.

True LAG players are a complete nightmare to play against, especially if they have position on you but flip the coin and have position on a weak loose player and you stand a chance of stacking them on numerous times before they either run out of money or quit the table. Isolate them, play as many pots as you can with them and get your hands on their bankroll before someone else does.

The hugely popular Grand Series of Poker may be resigned to the history books but for one man it is still very fresh in his memories and his heart because he took down Event #15 the $200 No Limit Hold'em Cubed and boosted his bankroll by a wallet-bursting $44,000. We caught up with him and asked him and thought it would be a good idea to give a little insight into this rising star.

Marc Macdonnell of Ireland is better known as sluglife in online poker circles but that name was taken on Betfair Poker so when he signed up, just before the GSOP festival, he chose “chickenIMO” purely because his “mates had been chirping at me for how much I loved chicken,” explained Macdonnell. Like many players of his generation, Macdonnell started playing poker during his final year of school, which progressed to playing €1/€2 pot limit Hold'em cash games, despite being massively under-rolled for them. “ I didn't have a clue about bankroll management or anything and when I did hear about it I just ignored it as it seemed no where near as fun to go back to playing $5 SNG online. After a while with many ups and downs became friends with a lot of the top young Irish players and things have just gone from there.”

One of Macdonnell's friends is Eoghan O'Dea who has reached the final table of the World Series of Poker Main Event that takes place in just a couple of weeks time. Macdonnell is flying out to Sin City with a bunch of his other friends in support of O'Dea and admits that this latest win could come in handy because the trip could become very expensive! You may notice I said latest win, that is because Macdonnell took down the PartyPoker $200,000 Guaranteed tournament in July for just short of $50,000, money he is going to use for travelling expenses and to reinvest into his bankroll.

When he is not grinding out $50+ rebuy and freezeout tournaments in cyber space, Macdonnell loves to play live, saying he will play any decent tournament that is hosted in Dublin and he recently took part in the Betfair Poker Live Dublin Main Event. “I played Betfair Live but busted fairly early. There was one other aggressive player on the table and he just got the better of me on the day. I liked the tournament in general though, a lot of the live tournaments are absurdly slow and this one was faster.” Macdonnell now plans to play at GSOP Prague in December and you could too with out online qualifiers that start at just $1.05!

We asked Mr Macdonnell what advice he would give to up and coming players and he said the he thinks every player should stick to bankroll management and study the game as much as they can. He also says that if you are a tournament player you should bide your time when you are short-stacked because he often sees players “lose a big pot then just shove in the next available opportunity with any bag of spanners.” Sound advice from the Irishman.

So keep an eye out for the moniker “chickenIMO” at the Betfair Poker tables and the name Marc Macdonnell in future live events. Congratulations Marc, everyone at Betfair Poker wishes you continued success at the virtual and real felt!

Poker players rarely shy away from any opportunity to make bets or swap percentage with each other but the infamous Antanas Guoga, better known as Tony G, has taken it one step further and essentially made a last longer bet with himself that could see him win an additional $100,000 just for making it to the money places of the World Series of Poker Europe Main Event.

The €10,400 Main Event is into its third official day of play and the 593 have been whittled down to 89 survivors (at time of writing), of which only 64 of them will be paid out. A min-cash is worth €20,000 but if Tony G scrapes into the money he will pick up $100,000 after betting $20,000 on himself at odds of five-to-one that he would make it to the money places in the Main Event. At time of writing Tony G has a stack of 155,000, which is around 30,000 chips under the average stack.

In his blog Tony G said, “I am going to win the WSOPE Main Event. First ten minutes, STRAIGHT FLUSH – then massive double up. I am on a roll. I even bet $20,000 at 5/1 that I will make the money in the Main Event.” This means that if Tony G does make it to the money he will pick up more than the official ninth place finisher will do, including the bet amount and tournament prize money.

Betting and poker recently hit the headlines when the 2010 WSOPE Main Event champion James Bord went on record to say that he would refund any losing bets of up to $500 on the “Winner of the WSOPE Main Event” market on the sports betting site Matchbook if an American player won the Main Event. Bord said to CardPlayer Europe, “I don't think an American can win the bracelet, Europeans are now far superior. We used to look up to the US players back in the day, but those days are now long gone. I'm prepared to put my money where my mouth is and refund any losing bets up to $500 if an American wins.”

If Tony G does go on to cash or go even better and take down the €1,400,000 first place prize, it will cap off quite a week for him as he has been chosen to replace Dario Minieri in the Caesars Cup, which is to be played after the Main Event finishes. No reason has been given for Minieri's withdrawal but Team Europe Captain, Bertrand “ElkY” Grospellier has asked Tony G to replace him. "I couldn’t say no, it is an honour,” said Tony G, “I really cannot wait. It is true that I am the captain but on this occasion Elky is as well.”

Can Tony G make it to the money and beyond or will the loudest mouth in poker be shouting for all the wrong reasons? Tune in tomorrow to find out either from the excellent Short-Stacked Shamus or myself, here on the Betfair Poker blog.

Join Betfair Poker Now

Phil Hellmuth came frustratingly close to winning his 12th World Series of Poker bracelet not once but twice at this summer's WSOP, finishing as a runner-up in the $10,000 Seven Card Stud Hi/Low and the $50,000 Poker Players Championship events and he has come very close again, this time at the WSOPE.

The eyes of the poker media were fixated on Hellmuth during the final day of  Event #1 the €2,680 Six-Handed as he started second in chips, from 12 players, with a massive stack of 401,000 chips but within the first half hour of play he was back down to below average.

Hellmuth's Demise Begins

The slide began when Hellmuth raised to 18,000 (blinds 4,000/8,000/1,000a) and then instantly called when Adrien Allain moved all in for 123,000. The 11-time WSOP bracelet winner turned over 9s9d and found himself up against his French opponents AcTh, a typical coinflip scenario. The dealer got busy putting out the Td-Tc-Kd flop, which left Hellmuth drawing very thinly indeed and when the turn and river were the 4d and 8h respectively, he dropped to 280,000 chips.

Allain was a constant thorn in Hellmuth's side and he seemed to have the measure of the “Poker Brat,” constantly attacking him. In one hand Allain raised to 17,000 and Hellmuth three-bet to 54,000 with 170,000 behind. Allain moved all in and Hellmuth said, “I don't think I can can,” and mucked his hand. Shortly afterwards the pair clashed again, which prompted a rant from Hellmuth.

In the hand in question, Allain made it 17,000 to play from the button and Hellmuth three-bet to 45,000 from the blinds. The Frenchman then four-bet to 100,000 and Hellmuth started to talk. “This is so sick. This is the third time you bluffed me, but the fourth time I will have aces. Nice bluff kid.” When he had finished teaching his opponent he folded and showed Ah8c.

Hellmuth Blow-up

There are many modern day poker players who say Hellmuth has a very questionable style of play and he has done himself no favours if the live reports on PokerNews are anything to go by. There were a series of hands that seem so wrong and they are all going to be written here. In one hand Azusa Maeda opened to 18,000 from under the gun and Hellmuth three-bet to 54,000 from the big blind. Maeda then moved all in and Hellmuth quickly folded despite only having 72,000 chips behind.

Shortly afterwards his nemesis, Allain, opened to 21,000 from the button and Hellmuth called from the big blind. Hellmuth checked the Kh-8d-5d flop and then folded to a shove from Allain, again despite only having 60,000 chips. The strange plays continued as the action folded to Hellmuth in the small blind and he open-limped then folded to a raise, before calling another raise from Allain and folding to a shove on a Th-9c-9s flop.

Yet another questionable play occurred soon after when everyone folded to Hellmuth in the small blind and despite having 5,000 invested in the small blind and only having 15,000 chips behind, he folded! He finally got his minuscule stack in after a Maeda limped in and Marton Czukzor moved all in. Hellmuth called and showed KsJh when Maeda folded and was up against Ac4h. The final board ran out 6c-Qh-6d-2d-4s and with that Hellmuth was eliminated in seventh place, a finish worth €24,183.

Hellmuth's next chance of adding to his 11 bracelets, the last of which he won in 2007, is in Monday's €5,300 Pot Limit Omaha event. Tune in during the week to see if he does add another piece of poker jewellery to his collection or if he blows up at the vital stage of the tournament like he did earlier today.

The European Poker Tour London Festival has now drawn to a close after Benny Spindler took down the Main Event and now some of poker's biggest stars are heading to Cannes, France for the 2011 World Series of Poker Europe.

Since its creation back in 2007, the European edition of the World Series of Poker has been held in London and has been a roaring success but this year's WSOPE has been moved to the French Riviera where it will stay for at least the next five years. One of the reasons for the move was so the fields could be larger but whether this actually happens remains to be seen, especially as larger buy-in events, even on the European Poker Tour have seen reduced numbers. Hopefully attendances for the WSOPE will be through the roof as it is an amazing festival and we should all get behind it.

Today marks the start of the 2011 WSOPE, at 17:00 local time the €2,680 Six Handed No Limit Hold'em Event, a three day tournament that should be a firm favourite with the internet generation. This event made its debut at the 2010 WSOE and saw Phil Laak win his first bracelet and £170,802 when he bested a field of 244.

Then tomorrow is another event that should be very well attended, the five-day €1,090 No Limit Hold'em event. The low buy-ins at both the WSOP and WSOPE are very popular and last year's tournament saw 582 players squeeze into the Casino at the Empire, creating a prizepool of £582,000. It was eventually won by Scott Shelley, who defeated JP Kelly heads up to deny Kelly the chance to win the very tournament he had won in 2009.

The WSOPE runs for the next 14 days and as soon as we have any news emanating from the Le Croisette Casino Barriere we will bring it to you here on the Betfair blog.