Irish Open Poker Championship Organisers Show Unneeded Concern
April 13, 2009
Due to the recent economical events happening across the world, the organisers of the well attended Irish Open feared for its participation figures this week.
The recession has hit alot of tournaments and companies all over the world, reducing the income that they would usually receive.
The organisers were expecting a drop in the participation figures in the tournament, with 667 players turning out for the tournament last year.
But as the tournament opened it became clear that their concerns for the figures were uncalled for, with 701 players turning out to take their seat at the felts.
The registration of the 701 players means that the prize pool for the tournament reaches €2.2 million.
The reason behind the great turn out for the tournament was the work that the dedicated team of organisers placed into the setting up of the tournament after one told of how much work they had to place into the promotion of the tournament to avoid disappointing numbers.
But the turn out was something that even they didn’t expect with Paddy Power host Paul Burke saying:
A lot of poker players don’t have the same disposable income they had this time last year. If we had got 600 players we would have been very happy.
Almost half of the entered players were from overseas, showing that the attraction to play in the tournament was great to even players from the likes of Canada, with one car sales man taking the trip to buy into the tournament.
When asked why he had been attracted to travel the distance to enter the tournament, he simply said that the thrill of playing poker is the winning.
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