Steve Ruddock
Coming off a week when Victoria Coren made history for women and for the PokerStars European Poker Tour, you would think there might be a shortage of headlines coming out of the UK poker scene, but that was certainly not the case this past week.
The news items may not have been as historic as the first two-time EPT Champion being one of the best-known female poker players in the world, but there was a nice mixture of tournament winners, developments on the legislative front, and even a bit of sideshow news.
This week we’ll take a look at the latest results from the WPT UK National series and the GUKPT. We’ll fill you in on the latest happenings with Full Tilt Poker pro Sin Mellen. We’ll take a look at a new regulation about to go into effect targeting gray market operators in the UK.
Stay tuned for the details on all of these stories and more in this week’s installment of Around UK Poker.
UK Gambling Commission cracking down on gray market sites
The UK Gambling Commission is taking a cue from other locales in Europe and even in the United States who are worried about black market operators, as the UKGC has started cracking down on gray market operators according to an article on PokerFuse.com.
Gray market operators are different than the standard black market operators in that they are not operating illegally in a country per se, but are simply operating in countries without a license – which could easily be due to a country not having a regulatory framework in place.
Any companies doing so and receiving more than 3% of their revenue from said market will now have to explain themselves to the UKGC.
This is an incredibly interesting development and I suggest reading the Pokerfuse.com article linked above for all the details.
Deadbeat dads get some good news while my head explodes
This week produced one of the stranger stories I can recall ever reading, as a judge in the UK decided that playing poker was not gainful employment, and that wasn’t the crazy part! What blew my mind was that because it wasn’t gainful employment a deadbeat dad didn’t have to pay child support with his poker winnings!
Three hours later when I woke up after I had suffered what I presume to be a mini-stroke from reading the article I scoured the Internet for the rest of the story – you know, the part where the judge forbade the man from playing poker and forced him to get a real job so he could take care of his kids, but that part of the article doesn’t exist! Three hours later I awoke again and still can’t believe this actually happened.
Bizarro world stuff right here.
Sin Mellen gets some ink in The Independent
Full Tilt Poker ambassador Senim Mellen (usually referred to simply as Sin Mellen) has been a hot commodity in the UK poker world over the past year or so, not only with her Full Tilt Poker sponsorship in hand, but her poker skills have also been garnering a lot of attention. And on the heels of Victoria Coren’s EPT win, female poker players and their thoughts on the game are in high demand.
Sin got a little more exposure this past week, landing a feature in The Independent where she talked about her journey in poker thus far.
UK News Bites
GUKPT Brighton
180 players took part in the GUKPT Brighton this past week, with Chris Cousins taking home the hefty top prize of£20,000 and his first major tournament victory.
Here is a look at the final table payouts from the tournament according to the GUKPT blog:
- 1st – £20,300 – Chris Cousins
- 2nd – £19,800 – Hui Jin
- 3rd – £19,800 – Chris Barnes
- 4th – £7,800 – Ben Winsor
- 5th – £5,400 – Martin Bader
- 6th – £3,900 – Joe Greenfield
- 7th – £3,200 – Francois Goulet
- 8th – £2,700 – Lee Taylor
- 9th – £2,300 – Ellie Biessek
WPT National Series Newcastle
Darren Mapley is the latest winner on the WPT National UK Series, with his win in Newcastle. For Mapley is was his first live tournament victory and his first cash of any significance (he has a total of five career cashes now), but it is his fourth cash of 2014 according to The Hendon Mob.
- Darren Mapley £17,500
- Mark Gray £12,245
- Hazel Birchnall £7,875
- Gary Copeland £5,825
- Andrew Hetherington £4,375
- Alex Walton £3,500
- Mark Harding £2,905
- James Brady £2,325
- Robert Patrick £1,740
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