blonde poker

I first played cards with Joe Barnard over a cloth-draped coffee table in the common room at New College, Oxford. It may be hard to imagine, but there was a time when there were just a handful of students who knew how to spend their loans playing the now near-universal game of poker, and he was one of them. Having, in his own words, become hooked on poker after winning 70p off his dad in 5-card draw with quads over quads, he spent time not consumed with completing his Maths degree assembling a small hardcore group of gamblers for regular low-stakes games in what was basically a TV room with a pool table.

He started off with the tried and tested Late Night Poker format, betting with some old washers which started off silver and gold, and slowly became silver and silver as the paint came off. The whole idea for the University Poker League came about as he set up the Oxford Poker Society “for a joke, really.” The £50 he received for formally declaring his club a Society meant that some real chips and plastic cards could be obtained. This was a relief for Joe as “those washers were well heavy.”

After the creation of the Poker Society in 2002, there came about the regular Oxford Cup no-limit tournament, which was first held in the Long Room at New College, with a field of about 40. His dad (the man who one might say was responsible for the whole thing, having taught him how to gamble in the first place) oversaw the tourneys in the guise of Tony da Ref, and, in fact, still does. The Oxford Cup has now found a regular home in the ballroom at the Randolph Hotel, and this year over 200 entrants, both students and pros, attended. The celebrity guests the UPL has managed to attract make an impressive list – Phil Hellmuth has flown over specially to play in the tournament, and this year’s guest speaker was Greg Raymer. Now Blonde’s own Dave Colclough is to be found wearing a University Poker League T-shirt…but I’m getting ahead of myself.

After Victor Chandler’s initial sponsorship for the league idea, they lost interest, unsure whether there was any money in student poker, but at this point Jon Sullivan, rightly confident that students just needed a bit of encouragement and information, stepped forward independently to create the University Poker League.

After finishing his degree, what else could Joe do but work for the League which he had envisaged all the way back when forming the Poker Society. “I had so many ideas for how the League was going to be run,” he told me, before outlining his plans for UK student tournaments and relating how the UPL’s UK vs Canada online tourneys had been going. He wasn’t sure what his actual job was called, opting for ‘UK Regional Manager,’ while Jon Sullivan suggested ‘Head of United Kingdom Marketing.’

Whatever his title, Joe appears ready to do whatever is needed to make the UPL a success. When I called him, he was in Derbyshire, helping to personally design cards and freebie items to be distributed in Freshers’ Fair stalls at universities, and used at live student events. His counterpart in Canada is still studying, but somehow they are planning simultaneous action across Canada. Considering how hard it is to make a student wake up on time, the whole operation seems to be very slick indeed.

Joe’s quietly capable demeanour hides a wry sense of humour and a clear love of the game. He still hosts a home game whenever he’s in London, although his guests seem to spend as much time fighting for control over his extremely eclectic music collection as playing cards. I have one small claim to fame – having introduced this all-round poker entrepreneur to Omaha, which was not featured on Late Night Poker and was apparently, in 2000, only being played in Oxford in my room on Wednesday nights.

Now, five years on, the University Poker League is continuing to expand. Thirty-three different societies are listed under their UK banner alone. Ranking point tournaments encourage a healthy competition between the student brethren, and there are enticements in the form of freerolls and bonuses. Waterloo University, Canada, I am told, are current victors in the rankings, (receiving a $500 freeroll for their efforts). Joe says he hopes their sponsored pro, none other than El Blondie himself, might just turn up to give them a run for their money...

The UK home page on www.universitypokerleague.com pronounces them to be “proud sponsors and home of Dave ‘El Blondie’ Colclough” and you may have noticed the UPL banner floating around on blondepoker. It’s worth a look even if you’re not a student, if only to see the world’s first poker Crest, complete with motto: “Let’s play cards.”