Paddy Power Poker hosted the 2010 Irish Open at the Burlington Hotel in Dublin beginning on April 2nd. The event would see numerous poker pros competing in the four day event with a buy-in of €3,500. The tournament had 707 players competing for a piece of the €2,500,000 prize pool.
The tournament took place over four days and several top poker pros competed in the event. Jamie Gold, Dan Harrington, Noel Furlong, Brian Townsend, Kara Scott, Dave Ulliot, Tony Cascarino, Padraig Parkinson, Michael Greco, Ken Doherty, Neil Channing, Christer Johansson and Andy Black, just to name a few.
The tournament was very exciting and with so many poker pros competing you would think one of the big name players would take the win, but that was not the case. In the end it was twenty year old Englishman James Mitchell who earned the six figure win.
Once final table play began, the tournament would really get exciting. The first to exit the event was Peter Murphy. Murphy’s A-K suited was beaten by Mitchell’s K-10 suited, so Murphy would exit in eighth place.
Murphy would be followed by Declan Murphy whose A-K of diamonds was not match for Paul Carr’s pocket tens. Sixth place would go to Edmund Sweeney when his K-4 ran into the A-10 of Ben Roberts. Roberts would follow right after Sweeney when he put his Q-J up against the A-K of Santeri Valikoski. Fourth place would go to Rob Sherwood who put his K-Q up against the A-10 of Carr.
This would leave only three players in play: Mitchell, Carr and Valikoski. Play would go back and forth until Valikoski would push his short stack in with 10-5. The cards would not do against Mitchell’s K-3 and he would be eliminated in third place.
Once Carr and Mitchell began heads up play, the competition would be fierce. At one point, Carr would get down to just 700,000 in chips but he would work his way back and take a big hand from Mitchell, which gave him 1.4 million in chips to the 5.6 million of Mitchell.
On the final hand, Mitchell held A-8 of hearts and raised 160,000 on the button. Carr called with Q spades 5 diamonds and the flop fell J clubs-J diamonds-8 clubs. Carr checked and Mitchell bet 205,000. Carr went all in and the turn card fell a 4 of spades and the river was an 8 of spades so Carr didn’t get the help he needed.
The tournament was over and Carr would have to settle with second place while Mitchell earned the top spot. Mitchell took home the Terry Roger’s memorial trophy and the first place prize of €600,000.
Final Results:
1. James Mitchell – €600,000
2. Paul Carr – €312,600
3. Santeri Valikoski – €205,200
4. Rob Sherwood – €163,300
5. Ben Roberts – €130,600
6. Edmund Sweeney – €100,800
7. Declan Connolly – €75,000
8. Peter Murphy – €56,300
9. Yann Dion – €37,700