The World Series Of Poker's Main Event Is On Its Way

The main event of this year’s World Series is just a few hours away from its opening hands. The $10,000 No-Limit Hold’em World Championship will kick off tomorrow playing out for 11 days until a final table is reached. This is where things get a little different to previous years. For the first time, Harrah’s and ESPN have delayed the conclusion of the event’s final table until November 9. So, after reserving their seats at the final table, the players will head back to their regular lives, and await their fate… as will we.

Every year gets a little more promising for the European contingent, as poker boomerangs its way across the world picking up new players on its way back to the WSOP in Las Vegas. It has been seven years since there was a Euro main event champion, and in general the pickings have been slim. In 2001, Carlos Mortensen from Spain took home the gold, but before that there was only Irishman Noel Furlong in 1999 and Mansour Matloubi from Wales in 1990. Although anything is possible as the amount of international gold bracelets increases over the years.

Englishman James Vogl was the only European to win first prize in any of the World Series events of 2004. In 2005 however, there were four overseas winners; Maciek Gracz (Poland), Jan Sorensen (Denmark), Lawrence Gosney (England), and Willie Tann (England). That number increased to five in 2006 with Swedes Mats Rahmn and Anders Henriksson, Italian Max Pescatori, and Englishmen John Gale and Praz Bansi, and in 2007 five became six when two Irishmen; Ciarán O’Leary and Alan Smurfit, two Germans; Katja Thater and Michael Kleiner, Englishman Ram Vaswani, and Russian Alexander Kravchenko did Europe proud.

So far in this year’s WSOP, that record has already been broken. At time of writing, the number of Europeans to take home gold bracelets in the same year has increased dramatically to 11. The lucky 11 includes three Germans, two Italians, and one player each from Belgium, Denmark, France, Holland, Russia, and Ireland.

Despite the fact there hasn’t been many European main event winners, there has been an increasing international presence at the final table of the main event over the years.

Swede Mattias Andersson was the lone warrior on the final table of the 2004 main event. He was knocked out in eighth place with $575,000. 2005 faired a good bit better with Irishman Andrew Black coming fifth ($1,750,000) and Swede Daniel Bergsdorf, seventh ($1,300,000). Another two who made it in 2006 were Dane Philip Hilm in ninth place with $525,934 and Swedish Erik Friberg in eighth with $1,979,189. Finally, in 2007, Russian Alexander Kravchenko and Brit Jon Kalmar came closer to the finishing line, when they were knocked out in fourth ($1,852,721) and fifth place ($1,255,069) respectively.

Over the years the amount of players in the main event has risen rapidly. There were 839 entries in 2003, a much higher 2,576 in 2004 (most likely caused by online player Chris Moneymaker’s success the previous year), a massive 8,773 in 2005, and 6,358 in 2007. The turnout should be very interesting this year with a healthy mix of amateurs and pros, online and live players, and a wide variety of nationalities.

And so the bets are on for the 39th WSOP, but can anything really be predicted in poker? PaddyPower.com and BlueSquare.com seem to think so. As far as a favourite to make the final table, one European fairing well on both sites is Dane Gus Hansen at 66/1. Another for BlueSquare is Carlos Mortensen at 66/1.

PaddyPower also has Brit David ‘Devilfish’ Ulliott, Finn Patrik Antonius, Italian Dario Minieri, Irishman Andy Black, Spain’s Carlos Mortensen, and Englishman Ram Vaswani at 80/1 each. Overall, Phil Ivey is favourite for both sites at 25/1.

Carlos Mortensen sits on top of the ranks of top past champion with odds at 8/1 at PaddyPower and 9/1 at BlueSquare. Paddy Power also has Gus Hansen at 8/1 for top Full Tilt pro.

Keeping score in the little book of records — Russian Nikolay Evdakov became the first player in the history of the World Series to cash ten times in a single year (so far), and 50 out of 51 defending champions have failed to cash in their respective events. The lone exception, Blair Rodman.

There are, however, still questions left to be answered, such as will Doyle Brunson or Johnny Chan win their 11th bracelet and re-tie with Phil Hellmuth for the most bracelets, or indeed will Hellmuth make it a dozen? Will the main-event attendance number surpass last year’s figure, or will it shrink again? How will last year's champion Jerry Yang get on? How will the delayed conclusion of the main event affect the final table outcome? And of course, how will Europeans fare this year?

Time will tell all as the 2008 World Series of Poker $10,000 No-Limit Hold’em World Championship main event kicks off tomorrow.

Check back at CardPlayer.com regularly for updates and news from the Rio All-Suite Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas.

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