World Team Poker
Introduction
In an attempt to re-ignite the medias appetite for poker, beyond the world of poker blogs and poker websites, a new competition and format is to be launched in mid May – World Team Poker. Looking like the nearest thing yet to a world cup for poker, WTP will feature 8 international teams of five players each battling it out in a one day tournament at the Golden Nugget, Las Vegas on May 19th.
The Teams
Do you think she’ll do as the USA poker team mascot?
WTP began the process of creating the participating teams by enlisting the services of the eight poker team captains, who were then able to recruit the other poker team members themselves, the only condition being that they are all professional poker players. The team captains are: Phil Hellmuth (USA), Men Nguyen (Vietnam), Eli Elezra (Israel), Ben Roberts (England), Juliano Maesano (Brazil) and George Kapalas (Greece). The two other teams involved in this inaugural international poker competition are China and Australia, both of which are unable to name a single captain opting instead for co-captains; Johnny Chan/David Chui for China and Jeff Lisandro/Tony Guoga for Australia! Now if that isn’t sending out a message of poker indecisiveness before a hand is even dealt – I don’t know what is?
The WTP playing format
The buy-in per team for the event is set at $50,000, which let’s face it for these guys is nothing to get excited about. The poker games will be limit and no limit Texas Hold ‘em and pot limit Omaha, on a five table shoot-out. Although there are potentially 40 players available at any one time, don’t expect to see eight payers at each of the poker tables. To introduce something new to this poker game the captains can substitute poker players as they wish and can even coach their poker players on what to do. So you’ll actually get the chance to see how well the captain’s know their teams by how well they manage the players and the poker games they play in. Anyone can register to watch the poker fun online via the live webcast and, for US residents, possibly even win a trip to Las Vegas to watch it live