Is PartyGaming's room a bit pokey?

If it's not one thing then it's another. Straight after online poker group PartyGaming announced that chief exec Mitch Garber was cashing in his chips and resigning as chief exec, the company has been dealt another duff hand.

It has long sponsored the felts of the World Series of Poker tables, the game's premium event which takes place in Las Vegas each year. The gig's so huge that last year's winner bagged an even bigger purse than Garber himself, and yesterday the prestigious sponsorship was scooped by rival Everest.

I hear that that bet was worth about £8m, and this is important in the world of online poker because the sponsor gets to offer places in the main Vegas event to its own punters. That attracts extra players and the sponsorship was one big reason why PartyGaming's PartyPoker site could claim to be "the world's largest poker room".

Will that tag-line continue, I ask, aware that the stats suggest that hand has already been over-played?

"We no longer call ourselves the world's largest poker room," sniffs a spokesman, "because there are other sites that are larger".

Indeed, but that's not what your website says.

"I don't know where you're looking," the mouthpiece sniffs again, "but... oh, I've just seen where you're looking. You've caught me out there. I think I should go now." No more bets.

An hour later the spokesman's back: "PartyGaming remains the largest legal poker room in the world." What's he saying about the others?

News Added: 07 March, 2008

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