Expectations were high in the British camp at this year’s World Series Of Poker, but most came back empty wristed – what happened?
Audley Harrison
Brit ‘boxer’ runs good in Vegas. Lennox Lewis tried his hand at the Main Event last year and failed to cash. But Audley Harrison is obviously better with his gloves off as he not only cashed in a $1,500 WSOP event this year – 178th place for $3,982 – but he also managed a second place in the Bellagio Cup. The $76,895 should cheer him up after his dismal run in the ring of late.
Devilfish
We saw him as much on the Vegas dance floors as on the poker table and we’ve got one thing to say: don’t give up your day job!
The Devilfish was one of the early British success stories and he ended up cashing three times in this year’s Series. The $5,000 Pot-Limit Omaha bracelet was nearly his, but he bust out in third place when he failed to hit his open-ended straight and flushs draws on the river against Erik Cajelais.
It was a brilliant field that also boasted John Juanda (7th), Andy Black (11th) and Chip Reese (12th). Devilfish got $332,582 for his efforts but didn’t do so well in the Main Event. We asked him what happened. ‘I had 6300 left and was on the TV table. It was about 900 a round, so I had no choice but to make a move. I moved in with K-Q, and this prick called me with A-6 for 25 percent of his stack with five people after him. Is that the worst call ever? He hit an Ace on the flop of course, and that was the end of me.
I then had to do a TV interview and I think I was quite complimentary to him! This guy was the most miserable guy you’ve ever seen in your life. He had a face like they’d just carried him out of the waxworks. I said, “At least you’ve got rid of me, and this guy’s great for the TV. He’s smiled once all day, when that old woman on crutches fell over.” Even though I’ve got more experience playing in front of the cameras, they all want to make the moves!’
Marc Goodwin
It wasn’t a great Series for Marc but the Main Event took him back to the good old days – until disaster struck.
Despite playing in 13 World Series events, Marc Goodwin failed to register a single cash. However, his experience in the Main Event took Goodwin back, as he told us, to the basics of poker, where he confessed to really enjoying playing ‘like the good old days’.
Unfortunately, despite playing some of his best poker in recent years Goodwin failed to make any big impression on the tournament and eventually crashed out on Day 2. Sometimes, it doesn’t matter how well you play when you’re running bad. Marc recounted one particular hand for us from the tournament and even went on to say, ‘John Duthie was sitting next to me, so I’ve even got a witness.’ We were prepared for the worst…
Goodwin continues: ‘This guy raises and I call on the button with 6-6. Everyone else passes and there’s 3000 in the pot. The flop comes A-A-3, he bets 1000 and I know 100 percent that he’s got an Ace, so I flat-call him, hoping to hit. Sure enough, the turn’s a Six. He bets 4000 and I ask how much he’s got left. He said another 14,000 and I had about 60,000 at the time, so I said I was all-in. He called, and turned over A-6!’
Better luck next time, Marc…
Stuart Fox
Congratulations on a brilliant WSOP. How did it all start off?
I arrived in Vegas early June and played a bit of cash. Then I played the WSOP $5,000 Seven-Card Stud and $5,000 Pot-Limit Hold’em but failed to cash in either and felt like I played badly. And then you went into the $5,000 No-Limit Hold’em and played a blinder.
How did you lift yourself from the previous two tournaments?
I doubled up early when I hit trips. From then on I was chip leader on my table for most of the day and was able to pick up pots without putting myself in danger.
And did you play small-pot poker all the way to the final table?
With about 17 players left, I won two big pots on the bounce bringing my one million chips up to second, behind Michael Gracz’s 1.4 million, who was on my table. He didn’t want to tangle with anyone so I was able to run the table for a couple of levels. I then locked up as we went 10-handed, and at the final table I had the chip leader to my left all the time so I needed to pick my spot. The blinds were huge and I never found a hand but it seemed every other hand a player would get knocked out so I was happy to sit and jump up the pay ladder. Somehow I got to heads-up having only played two or three hands.
So you were the short stack?
I was a massive underdog – 500,000 to James Mackey’s 6.5 million. He went allin three times and I folded. When I did call, I was favourite with K-4 v 10-2. But he caught a Ten and that was that.
BRIT NUMBERS
TOP 10 BRIT WSOP EARNERS
1 Jon Kalmar $1,255,069
2 Stuart Fox $448,892
3 Dave ‘Devilfish’ Ulliott $352,522
4 Ram ‘Crazy Horse’ Vaswani $244,469
5 Richard Harris $193,650
6 Paul Kershaw $154,194
7 Julian Gardner $146,289
8 Roland de Wolfe $125,814
9 Andy Ward $124,816
10 Willie Tann $106,382
Number of Brits to cash: 139
Cash won by Brits: $5,562,719
Total WSOP prize pool: $159,796,918
Percentage of prize pool won by Brits: 3.48
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