This Week in Poker: December 14 – 20

In the PokerGuru feature, ‘This Week in Poker,’ we bring you the weekly roundup of the most significant online scores by Indian MTT players and the top stories from both the live and online poker circuits. Here are this week’s top stories!

The holiday mood has been catching on with Christmas just two days away.

With the 2022 FIFA World Cup ending on Sunday, much of the world’s attention was glued to the France vs. Argentina finale. As Lionel Messi’s side emerged victorious after a hard-fought match, the domestic virtual felts also saw Harshad Barve pull out an incredible victory in Spartan Poker’s ₹1 Crore GTD MoneyControl Poker For People, taking away ₹15.74 Lakhs up top, making him our “PokerGuru Star of the Week.”

Vikaash Shah, who converted a ₹1,100 satellite investment into a runner-up score, earned ₹14.80 Lakhs, adding to ₹14.90 Lakhs in weekly cashes.

Tanmay Benara, Rishabh Gupta, Vaibhav Sharma, Armaan Kochhar, Abhishek Agarwal, Abhishek Sonu, Avneesh Munjal, Manish Lakhotia, and Sumit Sapra were the other top scorers of the week.

Spicing up the Christmas festivities will be IndiaPlays ₹10 Lakhs GTD Christmas Carnival which will take place on Christmas eve (December 24) at 8 PM. In the run-up, the site has been hosting 17 tournaments, including step satellites, satellites, and multi-flights from December 19 (8 PM).

IndiaPlays is also hosting the month-long ₹1 Lakh Daily Leaderboards and the Hands Challenge Leaderboards (December 15 – January 14, 2023).

Natural8 hosts a Lucky Christmas Week, offering players who make deposits, attractive giveaways priced over $10,000.

While it looks like there will be no other big guaranteed MTT series to close out 2022, 2023 is sure to start off with a BANG!

PokerBaazi loyalists can look forward to a value-beginning to 2023 as the brand has announced that the unique 1000X Series will return for its second edition from January 1 to 8, promising ₹5 Crores in prizes sprad across 34 exciting tournaments.

Spartan Poker’s flagship India Online Poker Championship (IOPC) will make its 14th run from January 19 to February 5, 2023. The upcoming IOPC features ₹43+ Crores in prizes across 142 events, leaderboard prizes, etc.

Much to the cheer of live poker enthusiasts, the brand’s India Poker Championship (IPC) is coming back at the Spartan Live Poker Room onboard the Casino Big Daddy, Goa, after a three-year hiatus. The IPC will be held from February 14 to 20, featuring ₹7 Crores in prize pool guarantees.

Team India was in the thick of the action at Asian Poker Tour (APT) Da Nang Vietnam VSOP that took place at the Ballroom of Risemount Resort in Da Nang, Vietnam, from December 8 to 18. We saw a robust Indian contingent play at the series, with Aditya Agarwal, Pratik Jain, Akshay Kapoor, Aritra Dutta, Abhishek Paul, Paawan Bansal, and Shuchi Chamaria posting multiple FT finishes.

Anant Bhandari, Tarun Tageja, Shane Hodges, Anant Bhandari, Aditya Sushant, Priyank Gupta, Aditya Sarin, and Pratik Jain are some of the other Indians who posted cashes at the stop.

Singapore’s Benjamin Sai won the Player of the Series (POS) trophy on the back of eight ITM finishes, including two title wins. Sai won a seat in the upcoming APT Hanoi 2023 Main Event, scheduled from February 3-12, 2023.

A small group of Indians, Ankit Ahuja, Abhinav Iyer, and Zarvan Tumboli, also posted cashes at the 2022 WPT World Championship that ran at the Wynn Las Vegas from December 1 to 22. Ahuja headlined the Indian scorers, pocketing $9,978 overall for three ITM finishes.

Canada’s Eliot Hudon set a record, shipping the first-ever $10,400 buy-in WPT World Championship in just two-and-half hours, collecting a $4,136,000 prize.

In other news, the long-pending 48th GST Council meeting was held virtually on December 17. However, since the second report n online gaming, casinos, and horse racing was submitted by the Group of Ministers (GoM) to Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on December 15, it was not discussed in its virtual meeting. The report thus stands deferred to the 49th GST Council meeting.

In the meantime, Central Board of Indirect Taxes and Customs (CBIC) Chairman Vivek Johri divulged that the GST Council has sought the CBIC opinion on the matter, stating that the CBIC believes that 28% GST should be levied on the total bet value by a player and not the net commission charged by the gaming operators.

Online Railbird Report

Pune-based Harshad Barve dominated this week’s online domestic action as he shipped Spartan Poker’s unique MTT offering, the “Poker for People” tournament, for ₹15.74 Lakhs, following a heads-up deal with Vikaash Shah. Barve rounded out ₹15.99 Lakhs in weekly winnings, becoming our “PokerGuru Star of the Week.”

His top finishes include:

> 1st in Spartan Poker’s MoneyControl Poker For People for ₹15,73,477

The MoneyControl Poker For People runner-up Vikaash Shah pocketed ₹14.80 Lakhs in the tourney, adding to weekly winnings of ₹14.90 Lakhs.

Tanmay Benara rounded out a slew of top finishes, working out ₹13.91 Lakhs in cashes since last Wednesday.

His top finishes include:

> 2nd in Spartan Poker’s Thursday High Roller (6-Max) for ₹4,88,750

> 2nd in Adda52’s The Ballers for ₹3,92,385

> 3rd in Adda52’s The Mint for ₹1,66,950

> 3rd in PokerBaazi’s Daily Value Boost for ₹86,403

> 5th in PokerBaazi’s (7-Max) SPRINT for ₹85,750

Rishabh Gupta was another seven-figure scorer as he won two titles on Sunday and Wednesday, making away with ₹12.62 Lakhs.

His top finishes include:

> 1st in Spartan Poker’s Wednesday High Roller (6-Max) for ₹5,27,625

> 1st in PokerBaazi’s BSS SuperStack for ₹4,16,250

> 2nd in PokerBaazi’s The Endeavour for ₹2,44,625

Vaibhav Sharma added a hefty ₹12.20 Lakhs to his bankroll this week.

His top finishes include:

> 2nd in Adda52’s Godfather for ₹4,82,169

> 3rd in PokerBaazi’s BSS HighRoller for ₹2,60,000

> 3rd in Spartan Poker’s Armageddon for ₹2,33,392

> 4th in PokerBaazi’s The Weekly HighRoller for ₹1,60,200

Armaan Kochhar, Abhishek Agarwal, Abhishek Sonu, Avneesh Munjal, Manish Lakhotia, and Sumit Sapra were the other top scorers of the week.

Notable Winners of the Week

Spartan Poker Announces IOPC & IPC Offering ₹50 Crores in Guaranteed Prizes

Spartan Poker has unveiled the first of its online and live MTT offerings for 2023. The site will host the 14th edition of the India Online Poker Championship (IOPC) from January 19 to February 5, 2023, offering ₹43+ Crores in prizes across 142 events, leaderboard prizes, satellites, freerolls, trophies, Game of Tickets and the IOPC Crown.

The India Poker Championship (IPC) returns to Goa after a three-year hiatus. The IPC will be hosted at Spartan Live Poker Room onboard the Casino Big Daddy, Goa, from February 14 to 20, featuring ₹7 Crores in prize pool guarantees.

Read the complete report here

PokerBaazi is Back With the 1000X Series (January 1 – 8, 2023)

Starting 2023 on an explosive note, PokerBaazi has announced the second edition of its uniquely-designed 1000X Series. Running from January 1 to 23, the edition guarantees ₹5 Crores in prizes, giving out 1,000 times the value across all the 34 tournaments on the schedule.

The chief attraction is the ₹50 Lakhs GTD Main Event (January 8, 6 PM), alongside the ₹35 Lakhs GTD Mini Main Event (January 4, 7.30 PM) and ₹40 Lakhs GTD Kickoff (Jan 1, 2 PM).

IndiaPlays’ Christmas Carnival (December 19 – 24) & Daily & Hands Challenge Leaderboard Promotions (December 15 – January 14) Promise to Spice Up Your Christmas Festivities

Celebrating Christmas, IndiaPlays is hosting a ₹10 Lakhs GTD Christmas Carnival on Christmas eve, December 24, at 8 PM. The multi-flight tournament began proceedings by running 17 tournaments, including step satellites, satellites, and multi-flights from December 19 (8 PM).

Read the complete report here

Part of the festivities is the month-long ₹1 Lakh Daily Leaderboards and the Hands Challenge Leaderboards that start December 15 and run until January 14, 2023.

The ₹1 Lakh Daily Leaderboard is divided into three stakes – low, mid, and high – offering a chance to win ₹1 Lakh every day, basis the IP points you collect on the cash game tables.

The Hands Challenge Leaderboard features separate sprints running at the low, mid, and high stakes, laying out the chance to win exciting prizes. This includes Samsung Z Flip (High-Stakes), OnePlus Nord CE (Mid Stakes), and Samsung Galaxy A03s phones (Low Stakes) for topping the leaderboard.

Read the complete report here

Natural8 is Running the Lucky Christmas Week, Offering Depositors Attractive Prizes (December 19 – 24)

Asia’s favorite online poker room, Natural8, is running a Lucky Christmas Week, dishing out various prizes to players on making deposits. The giveaways are over $10,000 and include WSOP Winter Circuit Tickets, iPhone 14 Pro, iPad Air, Xbox Series S, etc.

Read the complete report here

2022 WPT World Championship Updates

The 2022 WPT World Championship at the Wynn Las Vegas hosted 23 tournaments from December 1 to 22, guaranteeing a jaw-dropping $22 Million in guaranteed prizes. The series showstopper, the $10,400 buy-in WPT World Championship crowned its winner in Canada’s Eliot Hudon, who lifted the Mike Sexton WPT Champions Cup, pocking the $4,136,000 up top.

Just before the series culminated on December 21, USA’s Stephen Song and Canada’s Lina Niu bagged titles. Song won the WPT Prime Championship title for a career-best $712,650 top prize.

Niu shipped the first-ever $1,000 NLHE WPT Ladies Championship, taking home her maiden live title for a career-best score worth $105,136.

Several Indian pros posted scores, including Ankit Ahuja, Abhinav Iyer, and Zarvan Tumboli.

Headlining the list was Ankit Ahuja who pocketed $9,978 overall for three ITM finishes, which include the $3,000 NLHE – 6-Max event (33rd for $7,350), the $600 NLH event (112th for $1,403), and another $600 NLH event (310th for $1,225).

Abhinav Iyer (85th for $7,158) scored at the $3,000 NLHE event. The 2022 APPT Cambodia Mini Main Event champion, Zarvan Tumboli (36th for $2,407), also posted a deep run in the $1,100 NLH Bounty Turbo event.

Read the complete report here.

Earlier, Canada’s Eliot Hudon captured the first-ever $10,400 buy-in WPT World Championship, crushing the gigantic 2,960-player field within a record two-and-half hours to secure the winner’s cheque of $4,136,000.

Read the complete report here

APT Da Nang Vietnam VSOP Updates

Asian Poker Tour’s final stop for 2022, the APT Da Nang Vietnam VSOP, played out at the Ballroom of Risemount Resort in Da Nang, Vietnam, from December 8 – 18.

As the dust settled, Singapore’s Benjamin Sai was declared the Player of the Series (POS). Sai cashed eight events at the stop, including the series-opener Event #1: Mystery Bounty and Event #18: High Roller Single Day, collecting 1,341.26 points. Besides the POS trophy, Sai won a seat in the upcoming APT Hanoi 2023 Main Event, scheduled from February 3-12, 2023.

A solid Indian contingent attended the stop, and there were several exciting moments over the past fortnight.

Pratik Jain final-tabled Event #31: Monster Stack, placing fifth for VN₫ 140 Million – his second FT appearance and fourth overall cash in the series.

Abhishek Paul wrapped up his Da Nang outing with a fifth-place finish in Event #33: Deep Stack Hyper Turbo worth VN₫ 15.350 Million, picking up his third final table score and fifth cash at the stop.

Read the complete report here

Veteran Indian pro Aditya Agarwal made two notable appearances. Agarwal ran deep in the Main Event, finishing 13th for VN₫ 156.64 Million.

He was also the only Indian advancing to Day 3 of Event #21: High Roller. Chasing his career-second APT trophy, Agarwal had an unfortunate end to his tournament run, falling in 10th place to collect a VN₫ 188.60 Million payout.

Read the complete report here

Speaking of the Main Event, another two Indians, Paawan Bansal (12th for VN₫ 187.96 Million) and Akshay Kapoor (35th for VN₫ 75.54 Million), posted deep finishes.

South Korea’s Doo Sik Nam lifted the Main Event trophy for his maiden live title and a career-best VN₫ 2.60 Billion.

Read the complete report here

The Main Event finish was Paawan Bansal’s second deep run in the series. He had earlier final-tabled Event#1: Mystery Bounty, finishing ninth for VN₫ 34.86 Million.

Read the complete report here

Among the other standout scorers was Aritra Dutta, who posted three final table finishes. Dutta across Event #12: Super Deep Stack Turbo, Event #17: Deep Stack Hyper Turbo, and most recently, Event #23: Deep Stack Turbo (seventh for VN₫ 15.97 Million).

Read the complete report here

Shuchi Chamaria added to the team’s tally with two final-table appearances. She started with a fifth-place finish in Event#4: Head Hunter amounting to VN₫ 46.16 Million.

Read the complete report here

Chamaria then made it to the Event #19: NLHE final table. She placed fifth for VN₫ 69.41 Million.

Read the complete report here

Shane Hodges, Anant Bhandari, Aditya Sushant, Priyank Gupta, Aditya Sarin, Ashish Munot, and Pratik Jain are some of the other Indians who posted cashes at the stop.

Indian Cashes at the APT Da Nang Vietnam VSOP

List of APT Da Nang Vietnam VSOP Winners

With this, we conclude this week’s roundup of the latest news updates and developments from the world of poker. We will return next week with our weekly report. Stay tuned.