Tournament coverage Poker

Storm in a Macau Poker Cup

Written by Pai Yao

This article first appeared in the Nov/Dec 2013 issue of World Gaming magazine.

Images: Kenneth Lim

The latest edition of the Macau Poker Cup was an amazing success for everyone involved. PokerStars Macau must be doing cartwheels over their impressive new home at City of Dreams with some big numbers throughout the duration of the event. Pity about the weather though …

It didn’t quite match the 891 players who turned out for the first Red Dragon event at the new home of PokerStars Macau at City of Dreams in April but the 645 entries for the HK$11,000 Main Event of the latest Macau Poker Cup must have organizers feeling pretty good about themselves. City of Dreams will be ecstatic with the number of patrons the room is bringing to their casino.

Great Britain’s Tom Alner came away with the title and also claimed what many would agree is among the most impressive tournament trophies in world poker along with the HK$823,000 first prize. But perhaps most pleasing for poker in Macau in general was the fact that the nine players comprising the final table came from eight different countries: China, Singapore, Japan, Australia, New Zealand, Portugal, Russia and the UK. Only Wilson Fu Chuanyu and Brian Long Yip were representing the same nation, China, albeit with the former from the mainland and the latter from Hong Kong.

What makes these figures even more impressive is that right in the middle of the tournament, Macau was pounded by some terrible weather generated by two typhoons which hit the region at the same time. Macau was lucky not to suffer the full force of either storm but there were certainly significant disruptions to those trying to arrive from overseas and numbers would have taken a hit.

The other notable event of the festival was the HK$20,000 2-Day event which saw 108 players fight it out for the HK$501,200 top prize. Attracting over 100 players for a side event tournament of this size is no easy feat and shows how the market is starting to mature in Macau.

We could talk about the Asian poker market until we are blue in the face. PokerStars Macau at COD feels like a world-class tournament venue. The players and staff move with a confidence and purpose that just wasn’t there a few short years ago. There has been a coming of age and even though poker has a long way to go in this part of the world, the fact that more and more players are making the pilgrimage – both from mainland China and further abroad – suggests it has an incredibly bright future.

Special mention must go out to Pierre, Danny, Fred and the team who continue to raise the bar when it comes to poker in this region. The PokerStars brand has had its good and bad times here in Macau but their commitment over the years, when many others might have thrown in the towel, could never be questioned.

Clockwise: MPC Main Event winner "Baby" Tom Alner, heads up play begins and the final table

Clockwise: MPC Main Event winner "Baby" Tom Alner, heads up play begins and the final table

The only downside to the Macau Poker Cup was the fact there were only two cash tables on offer. They could have filled 20. Of course, the big winner out of this was the (sadly recently closed) Venetian Poker Room which was jam-packed due to the overspill of players wanting some action on the cash tables. This adds more fuel to the table cap debate and whether poker tables should be included among regular table counts. It seems crazy that players should be turned away because of this unfortunate situation but that’s an argument for another day.

In the meantime, let’s hope the Macau Poker Cup and poker in general across Macau continues to show such solid numbers. It can only be good for all of us.