The Spring Championship of Online Poker (SCOOP) has turned out to be a brilliant tournament for UK and Irish poker players and there is no doubt that many people have made the right decision in choosing to play in this event. The fact that there is the chance to play for big money against some great players from the comfort of your own home is always going to be of benefit to many poker players. While having the chance to play against top class players in beautiful surroundings is a large part of the charm and appeal in poker, for many players, it is the comfort and convenience of playing at home that really provides the important aspect for players.
Of course, when you learn that UK and Irish players have managed to bag over $4m in the tournament you will wish that you had gotten involved yourself! This is a huge sum of money to be heading to these shores and while there have been a considerable number of online events in the SCOOP tournament, there has been a great deal of competition up for grabs. This PokerStars event has been a huge success and it seems as though there will be plenty of players clamouring for this event to return next year and perhaps even be extended into other seasons too. Now that Spring is slowly making its way into Summer, you can bet that there will be plenty of UK and Irish poker players who are hoping to see Summer, Autumn and Winter events of a similar nature!
No No, No No No No No, There’s No Limits!
Some of the latest successes at the SCOOP event have been found in the No Limit Hold ‘Em events. NLHE games are always going to be popular and the fact that there was such an affordable buy-in level for the event listed as number 21 on the schedule ensured that there would be lots of players involved. There was a buy-in price of $27 but there was also a $300,000 guarantee attached to this event so it was no surprise to find that there were plenty of players looking to get involved.
In fact, there were more than 23,000 players involved in the running and there was a UK player, going by the name of “Run Bad King” in the final four positions! The thing is though, with respect to cash, this player had a great time because they managed to pick up more cash than the second or third player. With deals being made between the last 5 players in the event, the cash prize of $35,892.38 was a great deal for this player. There were also three other UK and Irish players in the top 45, which when you think of the huge number of players involved is a considerable achievement.
The medium level, priced at $215 didn’t feature any UK players in the top 10 but James “jamerOK” Cawley came 21st, which is not bad out of a field just short of 6,000 players. In the High event, with a $2,100 buy-in event, two UK players broke into the top 10. A player called “JackRich” finished in 10th, earning $19,483.20 while “callmemanu” came fourth, earning $92,906.
Event 22 was another NLHE event and this had larger guarantees to play for! The low level event, priced at $27, drew over 25,000 players to it and there was a huge amount of cash to play for. The guarantee was set at $400,000 but the actual amount of money played for was over $615,000!
Two local players managed to grab a hefty chunk of this money. The player called “monk419” earned over $8,000 for coming in second place and gallant runner up “hartwith” picked up just under $46,000. The medium buy in level also smashed its guarantee amount and “mariivida” got into 6th place, earning $51,509.60. The high level event only welcomed 1,048 players to it but again, there was a UK player in the top 10. The “dagunman” John O’Shea came in 10th and received $22,008.
It seemed as though there was UK and Irish success at every event of SCOOP and it has been a hugely popular and profitable tournament for so many local poker players!