No More Booze For Brits

June 12, 2011, Posted by Jesse_May

Harrah’s Casino, June 10, 2011

Big news from the World Series of Poker with the extraordinary development that alcohol has been banned for spectators of WSOP final tables. A sign, now placed near the final table arena, proclaims “No Food or Beverage Allowed in the ESPN Final Table Spectator Area”. The ban appears to be a direct result of the enthusiastic support afforded by British fans and poker players towards their country mates when having reached a WSOP final table.

The news was first reported by Dr. Pauly at Tao of Poker, who commented: “If poker wants to be treated like a professional sport, then you have to allow fans to consume alcoholic beverages… Let's be honest -- the TV producers just doesn't like British people… I've seen plenty of insanely retarded rules instituted at the WSOP, but this is one of the worst.” Elissa Harwood from Poker News had a different take on the story. Implying that perhaps the ban is deserved, Elissa writes that the British railers were “littering like they're in a stadium, screaming themselves hoarse and even knocking over a wall on the final table set….[with] raucous cheering, heckling, and well-watered tomfoolery…”

Either way, one thing is for sure. The WSOP final tables just became a lot less fun. Not mentioned by either writer is the plain fact that little to no effort has been taken by the TV producers to make the WSOP final table action accessible to the spectators. The action is clouded from view, chip counts are rarely to never announced, and the action is mostly hidden.

The live spectator experience for friends and fans has just gone from bad to worse. 

The Pokerfarm caught up with Dean Smith from Northern England to get his reaction to this news. You can see what he had to say about it all here in this video.