Crowds Gather for GPS Nottingham, PCA Parties, Ivey Staying Strong

GPS Nottingham Nears 1K Entrants

A busy day inside Nottingham’s Dusk Till Dawn card room saw 256 players take to the felt in search of GPS glory. Pushing the prizepool well beyond the £100,000 guarantee, the opening live session saw a number of recognisable faces make it through the day, including Sam Grafton, Tom Middleton, Ben Jackson and JP Kelly.

However, while the visiting pros were making waves early in the day it was Tony Housden making the most noise at the close of play. Having cracked the 300,000 chip barrier, Housden was able to finish ahead of Simon Deadman on the daily leaderboard and move comfortably into Day 2 with a dominating stack.

Today’s session has seen more than 500 players take to the felt, including the likes of Jerome Bradpiece, Paul Jackson, Niall Farrell and Julian Thew who is taking another shot after failing to survive yesterday’s session.

At the time of writing more players were lining up to join the action and the organisers are still hoping to get close to 1,000 entrants.

For live updates from the felt, click here.

PCA Party Gets Out of Hand

The action might be hotting up at the felt at this year’s PCA, but it seems the real action is going down inside the player’s hotel rooms.

According to reports from Czech poker website, iSport, Tomas Junek decided to host a party in his room but after a few drinks it would prove to be a decision he’d regret.

As the alcohol flowed the antics started to get more and more out of hand and before security could put a stop to things a plasma TV was ripped from the wall and thrown into the bathtub.

As if that wasn’t enough, one of the Czech partygoers was then seen hanging from the balcony of Junek’s room on the 17th floor.

Following the incident Junek had his passport confiscated by the hotel and he was ordered to pay a $6,000 fine.

Ivey’s Not Busto

Any fears that Phil Ivey might have lost the bulk of his bankroll were allayed earlier today when he posted a message on Instagram announcing his excitement at playing this year’s Aussie Millions:

“After all these years, I still love playing poker. Looking forward to kicking off the New Year with a trip to the 2014 Aussie Millions later this month.”

Clearly still in love with poker, Phil will no doubt have a few things to prove when he takes to the felt; something many of his peers will no doubt be mindful of when the action gets underway.