In any sport, people always want to know who's top dog, and the phenomenal
rise in the popularity of poker has led to a strong demand among casual
and professional players alike for stats to decide just who is the
‘King of the Chips’.
In similar vein to golf’s PGA Order of Merit or the ATP Tour
rankings in tennis, European Poker now has a backer for it’s
‘league table’ following the announcement of a two-year
deal by William Hill Poker.com with Poker In Europe.com (in association
with Poker Europa magazine), to back The William Hill Poker.com European
Poker Rankings.
Devised to rank the top performing players on the European poker stage,
there have been four previous winners: Pascal Perrault of France in
2000, Marcel Luske of Holland in 2001 and 2003 and Gary Bush of England
in 2002. The current holder of the title for 2004 is Willie Tann of
England and the current leader is Englishman Julian Thew.
For 2005 there are currently 66 different ranking tournaments, with
well over 300 individual events. To help level the playing field,
and not favour players able to play in more tournaments than others,
it was decided in 2003 that only a players' top ten results would
count towards the overall ranking list, and their top five results
would count towards the individual games lists (Holdem, Omaha and
7 Card Stud).
Dan Taylor, Operations Director for Williamhillpoker.com commented;
“William Hill Poker.com is extremely proud to be the title
sponsor of the European Rankings. It is wholly appropriate to be backing
the leader board for the best in Europe, and will serve to further
strengthen the williamhillpoker.com brand right across the continent.”