AFTER CRICKET, THERE SHALL BE… POKER?!

Later on, he added: “My eight years involved with Hampshire have been a wonderful experience. Memories that will last with me forever and likewise the friendships that have been formed at the club. Unfortunately I am retiring from all first-class crickets but will participate in the IPL. Due to some exciting business opportunities and wanting to spend more time with my children, I had to make this call.”

Can you imagine that Rajasthan Royals actually bought Warne for $A490,000 by during this month’s IPL player auction? After seeing the mass hysteria around this mad decision, they must have immediately decided against the move, although he says he was the one decided to focus on a poker career and his children. Ain’t that sweet? But, it’s wrong!

Through his lifetime career, Warne took about 708 wickets in 145 Tests, following his 1992 debut. He was going to play for Hampshire again this season, but the county club’s chairman, Rod Bransgrove, said the two parties had mutually agreed to a parting of the ways. Of course, he forgot to mention he first chase him down with a 22 rifle and a sack full of pennies…(kidding)

According to couriermail, Warne also said: “I know this will be a major disappointment to many fans of both Hampshire and Shane but, after much discussion and soul-searching, it has become clear to both of us that Shane can no longer make the commitment required to continue to lead Hampshire.”

In response, Hampshire chairman, Rod Bransgrove added: “When Shane came to us in 2000 Hampshire were a sleepy provincial club,” he said. “Now we are among the leading sides in the country and much of that is down to Shane.” Don’t get to emotional, guys!

It seems like Warne’s ability to fulfill the final year of his contract in England became uncertain, after a conflict with the Indian Premier League, when the dates for the new Twenty20 competition were put back, from April 18 to June 1.

Several negotiations with Bransgrove, forced Warne to return at the end of July with the aim of playing through August and September. It was back then, when Bransgrove, detected a change in tone from the player, for the first time.

According to the Australian, Bransgrove said: “He was so keen to come back and we were so keen to have him. Over the past week he has been away with his kids again, for the second time this year, and nobody can overestimate how important that side of his life is to him.We both arrived at the same conclusion and in the end we both knew that it was the right thing to do. He was as sad as I was.”

Warne was already separated from Simone, his wife, and was keen not to spend longer than necessary away from his three kids, Brooke (10), Jackson ( and Summer (6).

If you come to think about it, this is a really sad story, however, we’re keeping our fingers crossed for you, Warne buddy and welcome in the club! Poker rules!

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PART TIME POKER RULES POKER STAKING INDUSTRY!

PartTimePoker does have time to lose! The online poker destination has just announced that it has completed the acquisition and integration of the largest poker staking site, formerly known as NeverBeg.com.

According to a recent press release, this smart move does not only provide PartTimePoker users with a new, exciting feature, but also vaults PartTimePoker into the top tier of online poker sites, when it comes for its members, impressions and overall traffic.

It has been also reported that PartTimePoker Staking offers players and backers instant access to the largest poker staking network available online, with over 15,000 members and thousands of dollars of offers posted daily.

Staff at PartTimePoker stated that users will now be able to utilize this exciting new feature, in addition to the added power added to PartTimePoker, which is definitely going to racket up the company into the top tier of online poker websites in terms of not only traffic or website visitors, but in terms of impressions and membership base as well.

Nevertheless, PTP Poker Staking provides users with a wealth of information and an advanced set of exclusive tools that help to manage and automate the entire staking process from both sides of the deal. Besides that, all registered users also gain access to one of the most active poker forums online, with dozens of new members and thousands of new posts recorded every day.

Nowadays, staking is one of the fastest-growing activities in the online poker community. In fact, the practice of buying and selling pieces of an individual player is one that has a long history in live poker rooms. As the online poker community has matured, it only came natural for a robust network of backers interested in profiting from backing online players to develop.

However, while it’s not always fully discussed or revealed, quite large majority of top online pros are using some sort of backing arrangement to reduce their risk and variance. But, PTP Staking offers unique opportunities both for winning players looking to hedge risk and backers looking to enter into profitable arrangements with those players.

You might also find interesting to know that, in addition to staking, PartTimePoker offers poker propping information, comprehensive poker room reviews, rake back offers, daily poker quizzes, regularly updated poker news, strategy articles, interviews, book and software reviews and poker jokes. What more could you possibly need?

So, this is how Part Time Poker rules the poker staking industry!

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MONTEL WILLIAMS JOINS EUROPEAN POKER QUEST!

 

Ladies and gentlemen, the poker guru, one man show, a.k.a  Montel Williams was recently named a member of Team USA to play in the PartyPoker.com Poker Nations Cup. The event will taking place in Cardiff, Wales from Apr. 7-10. Moreover, it seems like the talk show host and former Lieutenant Commander in the Navy was picked by team captain Robert Williamson III, and will be joined by team-mates Jamie Gold, Freddy Deeb, Chris Ferguson, and Chad Brown.

Famous Williams will compete in the $5,000 buy-in event against other countries like: Sweden, Britain, Ireland, Netherlands, and Germany hunting for an attractive team prize of $100,000. However, all winners of individual matches will take home about $20,000. Furthermore, Party Poker has added $100,000 to the prize pool. But, the final sees the team captains make tactical substitutions and strategic time outs.

Williams said of his national call-up, “I am thrilled and honored that I have been invited to be a part of Team USA for the Poker Nations Cup. My teammates are extraordinary, as I have played against many of them in the past year and now look forward to teaming up with them in our quest to defeat poker pros from around the globe.”

Surprisingly, Williams burst onto the poker scene only in 2007 WSOP Main Event, where he held the chip lead for the majority of one day.

But, he is no stranger to poker, as he first played the game when he was in the Navy, and often saw entire paychecks on the line during his tour of duty. According to Wikipedia, Williams was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis in 1999 and he now heads the Montel Williams MS Foundation. Ever since, he has organized numerous charity poker tournaments.

Obviously, there will be no qualifier from the United States, because PartyPoker doesn’t accept American players, due to U.S. online gaming legislation, so Williamson III thought Williams would be an excellent candidate to make up for the lost player.

As for the team of defending Swedish champions, it will once again be captained by Bo Sehlstedt and feature the same: Mats Rahm, William Thorsson, Johan Storakers and Anders Henriksson. And online qualifier, Johan Ocklind will join them as they attempt to repeat as champions.

The Irish team will be headed up by Captain Padraig Parkinson, joined by Donnacha O’Dea, Marty Smyth, Ciaran O’Leary and Liam Flood, Darren O’Brian will join the team as a qualifier.

As for the British team, it will be captained by Hendon Mobber Rolande de Wolfe, along with recent Irish Poker Open champ Neil Channing, Ian Frazer, Surinder Sunar, Joe Beevers and qualifier Francis Durbin.

The Dutch team will have Marcel “Flying Dutchman” Luske, as their captain, as well as Luske will be Eric van der Berg, Daan Ruiter, Thierry van der Berg and Quirijn van der Peet, as qualifiers.

And finally, the German team will be represented by Captain Michael Keiner, along with Andreas Krause, Benjamin Kang, Sebastian Ruthenberg and Thomas “Buzzer” Bihl. Thomas Potzal is the German qualifier.

Overall, featuring such a diverse group of players, the PartyPoker Poker Nations Cup is surely going to be one of the most thrilling international tournaments, in recent history. Don’t forget the event is being filmed for international broadcast!

Once again, these are the captains of the nations:

Sweden — Bo Sehlstedt,

Britain — Roland De Wolfe

Ireland — Padraig Parkinson

USA — Robert Williiamson III

Germany — Michael Keiner

Netherlands — Marcel Luske

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POKERTEK GETS $3 MILLION IN LOANS!

To us, the mortals, big loans are committed once in a blue moon! But if you’re name is PokerTek things drastically change! Remember the company has announced a needed infusion of cash last week? Well, apparently, they’re going to get it! It seems like a group of executives and board members at PokerTek have effortlessly lent about 2 million bucks to the Mattews-based company.

 

Besides that, PokerTek’s filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission has revealed they’re taking out another $1 million loan from UBS, in exchange for a lien against PokerTek’s holdings of auction rate securities. According to a recent press release, the loan was made personally by Lyle Berman, James Crawford, Lee Lomax and Lou White and it is extended to the company on favorable terms with no dilutive warrants and carries no prepayment penalties or performance covenants. In fact the Company agreed to secure the loan using PokerTek’s fleet of PokerPro tables in the field as collateral.

 

In the same press release, the chairman and one of the investors, Lile Berman, said that: “Quite simply, we believe in the future of the company. This loan allows our team to continue executing their plan that, thus far, has delivered revenue growth while efficiently managing costs.” So, they’re just expanding and not having any rough time?!

 

The legal terms seem to be rather permissive with this kind of money, as the loan was issued at an interest rate of 13% and involves an interest payable on March 24, 2010. Not to mention the agreement leaves open the possibility for an extra $1 million loan, in case what they’ve already sucked is still not enough!

The official representative’s statements were surprisingly neutral, as it has been reported that PokerTek was already facing some cash flow problems. In fact, at the end of 2007, PokerTek had $7.2 million in current assets on its balance sheet, but they had only a little more than $3 million a quarter, as a solid reserve. Apparently, even with improving performance, they’d still need to secure more funding, as the numbers they indicated in their last earnings report show they were not living the best days ever. Besides thatm the US credit crisis has just precipitated PokerTek’s cash concerns!

 

PokerTek’s CEO, Chris Halligan, added: “We are grateful to the founders who, by putting up their own capital, have demonstrated confidence in management and PokerTek. We had been exploring options over the last few weeks and had several offers from outside firms to fund the company. We believe that funding PokerTek from within the family’ and at such favorable terms was clearly in the Company’s best interest”.

PokerTek’s CFO, Mark Roberson responded: “We remain well positioned to grow in 2008. We remain confident in our future in both the casino and amusement businesses and look forward to reporting our Q1 results in April.”

 

Back in October 2005, PokerTek issued 2 million shares at its initial public offering in, raising about $28 million. Even if at the end of 2007, $6 million of PokerTek’s current assets were invested in auction rate securities, they have experienced failed during early 2008, meaning that they have not been able to liquidate their investments in the ordinary course of monthly auctions. Later on, on March 31st, PokerTek has officially reclassified their auction rate securities as “non-current assets.”

 

So, I just wonder, do they needed a push to go up, or are they down?

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