For card game fans in London, one of the most exciting events in the poker calendar has arrived and it is shaping up to be unmissable. The 888poker LIVE London Festival is running from November 22nd until December 3rd at Aspers Casino and will feature some of the biggest names in the business, including a number of past World Series of Poker Main Event champions. The festival will feature a two-day long High Roller tournament and will culminate with the five-day Main Event. There will also be nine other events with varying buy-ins, some of which are directly linked to their online counterparts on the 888 poker site. In preparation for the tournament, here is everything you need to know about the upcoming event and a look at its history.
What is the 888poker LIVE London Festival?
The 888poker LIVE London festival is perhaps the biggest live poker event on offer from the world-renowned online poker operator. Poker fans from all over Europe and across the pond flock to the English capital to compete. The festival features eleven separate events over twelve days, and there are huge prize pools on offer for the most successful players.
Aside from the High Roller event with its £2,200 buy-in and the Main Event which has a buy-in of £1,100, there other games which will be of interest to online players in particular. These include offerings which can be also found on 888poker’s online site such as the £110 Hurricane, the £60 Swordfish, and the £80 Turbo Deepstack.
One of the most tantalising aspects of 888poker LIVE London is the Super High Roller event in the final days of the festival, which will cost players £5000 to buy in and give them the chance to try their hand against some of the best poker pros in the world.
It has been reported that past WSOP winners Scott Blumstein, John Cynn, and Martin Jacobson are likely to take part in this competition for a chance to get their hands on their share of the impressive prize pool.
For amateur players who want to hit the big time, it would be a good idea to look to professionals like Blumstein for inspiration. The American 2017 WSOP winner was unknown in the poker world before entering the Las Vegas tournament and prevailing over all the other competitors. Prior to that, he had mainly played at online poker sites to build up his bankroll during university.
At the festival there will be a chance to meet the 26-year-old along with a number of 888poker ambassadors who will be competing. The Aspers Casino in Stratford is a short walk from Victoria Park in West London, an ideal location for a card gathering of this magnitude as it is one of the biggest casinos in the UK.
What are 888poker LIVE Events?
888poker is best known as one of the leading online poker operators. But it also sponsors events and professionals in the live poker world. Put simply, 888poker LIVE events are real-world poker tournaments which feature some elements from the online world, such as special events and features. The site often runs special tournaments and competitions in the lead up to these events to give players the chance to enter for free or watch as a spectator.
There have been a number of 888poker LIVE events in London before, and all of them have attracted players from all over. There has already been a smaller LIVE event at the Aspers Casino in 2018, which was a four-day tournament with a £120,000 prize pool. This competition also featured Action Clocks, which were used to speed up the action and raise the excitement levels.
One of the other major European cities to regularly host 888poker LIVE tournaments is Barcelona. The event took place from the 24th of May to the 4th of June this year and featured a similarly diverse list of events. Romanian poker pro Adrian Costin Constantin won the Main Event along with the Spaniard Joel Isla after the two agreed a heads-up deal to split the grand prize equally.
What were the Previous LIVE Events Like and how do they Compare to the WSOP?
While 888poker LIVE tournaments aren’t yet as popular as events like the World Series of Poker or the European Poker Tour, they do tend to make waves in the poker scene and have thrown up some memorable occasions in the past.
Last year, the Main Event had the biggest prize in the LIVE series history when Tom Hall took home more than £78,000. It was also one of the longest Main Event final tables ever seen in the UK after the tournament had been whittled down from its 427 players to the few hopefuls at the end.
The recent 888poker LIVE event in Barcelona featured a memorable showdown at the end, which turned into an unstoppable force against an immovable object-type situation. This was why the aforementioned heads-up players decided to settle.
The WSOP is the gold standard when it comes to poker competitions, and it is the event that every tournament wants to live up to. The Las Vegas competition is watched live by over 600,000 people and also boasts the most entrants of any poker competition. The number tends to steadily increase by the year, and this year when Cynn topped the pile there were 7,874 entrants to begin with.
It was only relatively recently that the ultimate poker competition started to attract such high numbers, though. If online poker continues to boom as it has done, events like 888poker’s could soon start boasting similar kinds of numbers.
With some iconic poker stars known to be in attendance and after the success of last year’s event, the 888poker LIVE London Festival is likely to be bigger than ever. Get down to Aspers Casino if you want to take part in or witness any of the action.