One of players’ favourite events on the Irish Open calendar is The Hendon Mob Championship, a one-day, €250 buy-in Hold’em tournament which gets underway at 4pm on April 4.
This year’s Irish Open is taking place from April 3 to 10 at the Royal Dublin Society. MainEventTravel.com is the Official Travel Partner for the Irish Open with a whole bunch of special deals for this year’s event offering accommodation and buy-in combined.
THMC is one of nearly a dozen Championship tournaments being held at the Irish Open this year but – thanks to its association with the world-renowned Hendon Mob database, and the original Hendon Mob gang – it’s one that people have particular affection for.
The Hendon Mob (pictured) is one of the best-known brands in poker and has been going – in one form or another – for well over 20 years. It all started in North London when a group of friends – Barny Boatman, his actor brother Ross, Hendon resident Joe Beevers and Ram Vaswani – started getting a name for themselves playing poker. At the time, there was really no such thing as online poker, poker on TV or poker sponsorship but the Hendon Mobsters realised that poker had the potential to become really big.
Barny Boatman said: “We realised we might be able to leverage this identity we had and turn it into a sponsorship deal of some kind. So, we started the website and started adding content. We wrote about our poker travels; we had a forum where we would discuss poker and then we started writing up profiles of players and adding tournament results. Over time people were actually asking to be in it!!
“We were conscious that poker was about to have its moment – culturally and possibly as a business – and we wanted to be part of what we foresaw happening.”
Their initiatives escalated into one of the world’s most significant poker resources. Today the Hendon Mob database contains over four million live poker tournament results and holds stats on more than 750,000 poker players and 500,00 events.
In 2013, the four Mobsters sold the Hendon Mob brand to French entrepreneur Alex Dreyfus who also started up the Global Poker Index and Global Poker Awards. The business has grown exponentially and now employs a team of six. In 2019, it launched The Hendon Mob Championship (THMC) which has become a prestigious addition to many festival schedules.
Roland Boothby, Head of Partnerships at the Hendon Mob said: “We wanted to hold the Championship at the Irish Open just because of the prestige of the event and also I’d long been an admirer of those guys. We approached them and they were very positive and receptive.
“The first Hendon Mob Championship at the Irish Open was in 2019. We then had two years online during the pandemic and came back with a live version last year. The Hendon Mob Championship tournaments have been very well received by organisers and by players. It’s a great event.”
This year’s Hendon Mob Championship starts at 4pm on April 4. All players kick off with a 15,000 stack and the blind levels go up every 30 minutes. Late reg is open until the end of Level 8.
Boatman says he and his fellow Mobsters are delighted that people still think of them in relation to the Hendon Mob brand. He said: “We are delighted to still be associated with it, albeit historically. People have a warm feeling about the Hendon Mob; we’re part of the history of it all – and part of the furniture.”
This year’s Irish Open is taking place from April 3 to 10 at the Royal Dublin Society and Boatman is really looking forward to it. He said: “Main Event Travel always sort out my Vegas trip, which makes me feel like some kind of aging rock star, or a spoiled child. I’m trusting them with the Irish Open too this year. They do get great deals.”
Last year’s Hendon Mob Championship attracted a total of 332 players generating a €71,215 prize pool. The winner was Waheed “Wadey” Ashraf who battled through a very long day to win the €10,825 first prize.
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