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Poker News Round-up: Week #51For the past few years the Poker Million tournament has brought the year to an end by rewarding its new champion with a million dollar prize, and 2008’s event saw four Irishmen, an Englishman and a Swede in the mix for the big seven figure payday. Amazingly two of last year’s finalists were in contention once again with Liam Flood and Marty Smyth both looking to improve on fourth and second respectively in 2007’s tournament. Smyth’s hopes seemed to have been dashed very early on when his big slick lost to Flood’s pocket kings to leave him in critical condition, and even the 100/1 available on the in running market didn’t look like any sort of value. A few swift double ups followed though and Svein Neilsen will have been disappointed that it was him who exited the tournament first when Smyth had looked an overwhelming favourite at one point.  Marty Smyth with his Poker Million trophy Kevin Allen was next to go, leaving the four Irish players to battle it out for the title with Marty Smyth right back in contention against Flood, Ciaran O’Leary and Eoghan O’Dea – son of 2004 winner Donnacha O’Dea. Eoghan has clearly learned a thing or two from his old man and amassed a big chip lead which looked set to cruise to the title when heads up against Smyth. O’Dea was one card away from victory when a cruel river doubled up Marty Smyth and sparked another revival from last year’s runner up. A swift turnaround ensued which saw all the chips head over to Smyth and his amazing comeback was complete within moments from being on the brink of defeat. The million dollar prize caps a spectacular year for Smyth who also won the WSOP pot limit Omaha $10,000 event and the Party Poker World Open in 2008. Despite serious bragging rights Smyth has an astonishing humility about him, claiming “I know I've had far more success than I've deserved….I do think I'm a pretty good tournament player, but I'll be the first to admit that I'm not in the same league as the really top guys.” If he doesn’t think he is in the top tier of players it would be interesting to hear how Marty’s assessment of himself compares to some of the other players who have picked up big wins this week. Various reports of the EPT Prague final table are less than flattering about the standard of play by certain players, particularly the Italians, yet two of them collected over a million Euros between them after claiming the top two spots. The 570 strong field was well represented by the Italian contingent and from those Salvatore Bonavena and Massimo Di-Cicco remained as the last two standing after third place finisher Andrew Chen was “basically robbed by some true performances of Eurodonkery at its finest” according to one reporter on the scene. The tournament drew to a conclusion when on a flop 2 Ever since the UIGEA was introduced Party Poker has taken a hammering and it has been another bad week for the marvelously named founders. Anurag Dikshit has been persuaded by American authorities that his best course of action is to plead guilty to acting in contravention of the 1961 Wire Act for his involvement with Party when they accepted custom from the USA. This comes despite the fact that Party stopped taking business from US residents once the UIGEA was introduced and has fully co-operated with the authorities since. It should also be noted that following through with this prosecution has already been found to contravene America’s WTO obligations in every hearing and appeal related to this matter. This is the first time the act has been enforced for anything other than its original intended purpose of prohibiting sports betting, and Dikshit has been hit hard. He faces fines of $300 million, is not allowed to travel anywhere outside of Europe apart from New York and his native India, and even then could potentially face a spell in prison as well. All very serious stuff which many would fight tooth and nail, but it seems that as a billionaire paying the fine and getting it out the way is preferable to spending the next few years engaged in a legal battle with the US Department of Justice. Party’s other co-founders Ruth Parasol and Russ DeLeon are said to be less willing to participate in any such settlement though.
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$90,000
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and couldn’t hit his optimistic draw after Bonavena called with 7
