The 2014 FIFA World Cup in Rio is right around the corner but Alexandre Dreyfus, Global Poker Index (GPI) CEO, has big plans of his own for poker’s own version of the World Cup. Dreyfus today announced the Global Poker Masters, where the top 9 ranked countries on the GPI will each send their top 4 representatives (based on GPI points accumulated over the year) to battle it out in a series of sit-and-gos that will eventually determine which country is poker’s world champions.
Th event is scheduled to take place in 2015 but no specific date or location has been announced yet. Dreyfus insists that the Global Poker Masters will be a ‘player-centric’ event, with no rake and plenty of ambitious ideas for TV and media exposure. Currently, the preliminary plan has each invited player putting up $10,000 of their own money – the exciting thing is that the GPI are prepared to add $100,000 to the prize pool in added cash, which should incentivise all qualifying players to take part.
Dreyfus says of the project: ‘Despite live poker consistently growing in popularity during the past decade (roughly 15% year over year), we believe we’re on the eve of a second poker boom thanks to the impending regulation and re-emergence of online poker in the United States. To realize this boom though, poker still needs innovations and greater traction, including new formats and exposure on a larger scale. It also needs to be promoted as a sport. The time is right to launch the Global Poker Masters because it is capable of doing exactly that. It gives the best of the breed from the world’s top poker nations a stage compete, and it’s an intriguing performance-based format to support.’
While the rankings will undoubtedly change in the next year, if the Global Poker Masters was to take place today there would be some major stars invited to compete. They include;
USA: Scott Seiver, Vanessa Selbst
UK: Simon Deadman, Jack Salter
Canada: Mike ‘Timex’ McDonald
Germany: Ole Schemion
This is just the latest in a long line of ambitious ideas the GPI has had to attempt to make poker even more mainstream. They acquired both TheHendonMob.com and the European Poker Awards, and their revolutionary rankings system is by far the best attempt yet to truly define who the best live tournament player in the world is. German 21-year-old Ole Schemion currently leads the rankings. PokerPlayer.co.uk wishes the GPI all the best in this exciting new venture.
To find out more about the Global Poker Index read PokerPlayer.co.uk’s EXCLUSIVE behind-the-scenes article by CLICKING HERE.
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