Easy Odds CEO David da Silva, like the rest of the world, was elated with the return of live sport. Easy Odds were able to adapt to the conditions brought on by COVID by focusing on developing the company’s efforts on the horse racing market. Silva sat down with Calvinayre.com Lead Reporter Becky Liggero Fontana to talk about the company’s success during COVID, leading to Easy Odds shortlist status for the SBC Affiliates award.

“Every sport pretty much stopped overnight and we’re in an odds comparison site for sports betting. People come to our site because they want to bet on sports and when there’s no sports it really made it tough for us, so traffic really much dried up instantly,” he said. 

“We were working on how we plug the gap, so the first thing we did was we realized there were still some sports going on in different parts of the world that probably would never have been of any interest to anyone. The other thing we did we just teamed up with Vinnie Jones. That kind of started to keep us going get traffic back on the site, it wasn’t obviously the same, but it definitely worked,” he added.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=15tp6_Bcl2cVideo can’t be loaded because JavaScript is disabled: David da Silva is grateful for the return of live sport (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=15tp6_Bcl2c)

Just 10 days remain to wait until we will know who the 2020 Poker Hall of Fame entry or entries are. With just one inductee this year, the final ten nominations have been revealed by the World Series’ official website, but there’s a curveball in there with the dual nomination of Lon McEachern and Norman Chad – the legendary commentary team behind the World Series of Poker.

The Poker Hall of Fame has been in place since the late 1970’s kicking off in 1979 with a flurry of inaugurations. Since then, it’s been either one or two inductees making the cut each year, with some of the best listed below:

Johnny Moss (1979)

Doyle Brunson (1988)

It was the challenge of the year. While Phil Galfond would later enter a battle against Chance Kornuth that is still rumbling into the New Year and a 2021 conclusion, his first Galfond Challenge will enter the history books as one of the most unforgettable poker showdown of recent years.

Taking on the legendary online player ‘Venividi’, Phil Galfond was up against it from the off. Starting slowly in No Limit Hold’em is one thing, but in Pot Limit Omaha, it can be disastrous – and it was.

In no time at all, Galfond was close to a million dollars down. Even for someone as talented as he undoubtedly is at the game, serious thought had to be put into whether he could continue to put up a good fight. Was it better to quit when behind but not bankrupt?

In the end, Galfond, who explained many of his high-level thought processes in social media posts, posted a link to a blog about his decision, which took fans to a page on Run It Once which said simply:

Christmas is a great time to play card games with your family and during the current CVOID-19 restrictions, there’s never been a better time to break out the playing cards and learn some more games, one that bring people together and don’t rely on you winning or losing money to have a good time. But which games?

Fortunately for you, we’ve got five classics that are easy to get playing quickly and a whole lot of fun. It’s up to you and your family or friends to decide if there are prizes to be won.

1. Cribbage

One of the most enjoyable ways to play card games with your family is the game of Cribbage, or ‘crib’. Playing two-handed crib with just one opponent is great, but do try four-player crib, which adds in a lot more layers of play and, of course, banter as you’ll have to team up with Uncle George when he doesn’t know a knight from a knave.

The Las Vegas leg of the World Series of Poker Main Event has been won and it was the final table chip leader Joseph Hebert who led from the start and sealed a memorable victory to turn $300 into $1.5 million at the Rio All-Suite Hotel & Casino in Sin City.

The conclusion of the nine-man final table was affected considerably in the approach to the action as just a day before the climax of an event that has not been a stranger to controversy, former WSOP bracelet winner Upeshka De Silva disqualified due to a positive COVID-19 test. De Silva, who would have gone into play in 8th place of the nine remaining players, busted in 9th instead, leaving the way clear for the eight remaining men to push for glory inside the Rio.

First to lose that opportunity was Gershon Distenfeld, who saw short-stack Harrison Dobin double-up before he himself busted, king-ten suited no good against Ron Jenkins’ pocket queens. Distenfeld, who famously said that he would donate all of his winnings to charity will be making out a cheque for a mammoth $125,885 thanks to De Silva’s disqualification.

Out in 7th place for $163,786 was Shawn Stroke, which would have disappointed any supporters he had at home, as he’d entered play second in chips. He left a long time before the heads-up, however, as his pocket threes couldn’t survive and were beaten by Jenkins, who had pocket queens for the second time, winning with the ladies both times.

South Korea’s casinos are struggling as the country struggles to flatten its pandemic infection curve, while the global gaming slowdown has pushed back the opening of an in-development integrated resort. 

On Monday, Grand Korea Leisure (GKL) informed investors that its three Seven Luck-branded foreigner-only casinos wouldn’t reopen as scheduled on Tuesday (29). Instead, the casinos will now reopen at 9am on Monday, January 4, provided the country’s third wave of COVID-19 doesn’t turn into a tsunami. 

South Korea reported a record 40 pandemic deaths on Tuesday and new infections topped 1,000, leading the Yonhap news agency to warn of a “looming medical system crisis.” GKL shut its two Seoul casinos one month ago, and its Busan property followed suit shortly thereafter.

GKL’s main foreigner-only casino rival, Paradise Co Ltd, shut its Walkerhill casino in Seoul on December 15, promising to reopen on Tuesday. But Paradise announced this week that Walkerhill would now stay shut until January 4 at 7am. All Seoul casinos were operating at only 20% of normal capacity on the order of local authorities. 

Nevada casino gaming revenue took a major hit in November, despite a record performance by the state’s licensed sports betting operators. 

Figures released Tuesday by the Nevada Gaming Control Board show statewide casino gaming revenue of just under $771.2m in November, a nearly 17.8% decline from the same month last year and around $50m below October 2020’s result.

The decline was largely expected, following Gov. Steve Sisolak’s late-November decision to halve casinos’ already limited capacity to 25% of normal. With the state’s COVID-19 infection rate showing no sign of slowing, Sisolak announced earlier this month that he was extending this restriction at least through January 15.  

The impact was felt most directly on the Las Vegas Strip, which saw its November gaming revenue slide nearly one-third year-on-year to $349.8m. Most other regions also reported negative growth, although Downtown Las Vegas – which is far less reliant on out-of-state customers and also benefited from the first full month of the new Circa property – gained 1.7% to $53m. 

COVID-19 has been the biggest disruptor of global commerce in recent years, even bigger than the recession-not-recession of 2008. As the year wraps up and 2021 is set to arrive, it’s a perfect time for businesses to take stock in how they manage their expenses in order to fuel better growth, and one of the major targets is the marketing budget. More than ever, it’s important to maximize the return on the marketing investment to ensure the dollar goes as far as possible, and there are several key areas where marketers can concentrate their expenditures to ensure greater returns.

Inarguably, social media is going to continue to be one of the primary sources of customers for years to come. Whether running an online gambling operation, a cryptocurrency exchange or any of a myriad of possibilities, marketers have to go where the consumers can be found and they are now found more on social media than any other platform. Over the past two years, there has already been a notable increase in social media marketing spend, increasing to almost 30% by the end of the third quarter of this year, and this isn’t expected to stop anytime soon.

Voice search deserves attention in 2021. It has yet to become an inherent part of Google’s search algorithms; however, as more consumers search from mobile devices, they are using voice searches instead of typing in their desired terms. The problem is that voice and text searches often result in unique results, which means marketers need to ensure that they are on top of voice search components and how they can be used to drive traffic to targeted results.

Interactive content, once viewed as a nice add-on, is now a necessity. A website or social media account that offers interactive content is guaranteed to receive greater engagement, as the content is seen as added value for consumers. The content is entertaining and visual, proving to be a greater attraction than stale and static content that never changes.

Events and conferences looked pretty different in 2020, as almost everything went digital for the first time. Here’s the five gambling events stories that interested you most in 2020.

Becky’s Affiliated: Rory Credland reveals his vision for ICE North America digital

Becky spent a lot of time conducting Skype interviews this year, and none of them got more attention than this talk with Clarion’s Event Director, Rory Credland. He explained how conferences were shifting to digital, and just how much work was going into pulling it off smoothly.

London Conference Week 2020 Day 2 recap: ICE London

Superbet has carved out a niche as the dominant sportsbook in the Romanian and Polish market. Global Director of Performance Marketing, Vedran Karaman sat down with Becky Liggero Fontana to talk about how Superbet’s marketing campaign is capturing the imagination of players.

According to Karaman, it’s about knowing your audience. “In Romania and Poland, you have more people talking about the event, comparing the odds and comparing the outright of the match,” he said. “It’s much more communication about the event and less about criticizing the offer. I’m criticizing the adverts which also massively depend on how you construct the offer,” he said.

Odds courtesy of OddsShark.com

TNT usually has the NBA doubleheader on Thursdays during the regular season but presumably because this Thursday is New Year’s Eve, the network has it on Tuesday this week. Clearly the marquee matchup of a busy night is Milwaukee Bucks at Miami Heat.

Those teams met in the Eastern Conference semifinals this past summer in the Orlando bubble. Milwaukee was a sizable favorite but lost in five games, in part because Bucks superstar Giannis Antetokounmpo missed the final two games due to an ankle injury. It probably wouldn’t have mattered, though, as the Bucks lost all three games with him and were 1-1 without. Miami was simply the better team and of course would end up reaching the NBA Finals, where the Heat lost in six games to the Los Angeles Lakers. Heat star Jimmy Butler is doubtful Tuesday with an ankle injury, and that has pushed the Bucks to 4.5-point favorites. They are 4-11 ATS in their past 15 road games.

The TNT nightcap is a matchup of rising teams from the Western Conference as Zion Williamson and the New Orleans Pelicans visit Devin Booker and the Phoenix Suns. The Suns were the only unbeaten team in the bubble but missed out on the playoffs. They made a huge trade this offseason in landing future Hall of Fame point guard Chris Paul, and he has fit in seamlessly. While neither the Pelicans nor Suns are good enough to compete for a conference title yet, they are getting there. Phoenix is -3 but 1-6 ATS in the past seven meetings as the home team.

Casino junket operators who lure Chinese nationals to gamble abroad could face up to 10 years behind bars under the country’s revised Criminal Law. 

This past weekend, the Standing Committee of China’s National People’s Congress approved a number of amendments to the country’s Criminal Law, including the new definition of ‘organizing and soliciting by casinos abroad’ that was proposed in October. 

Article 303 of the Criminal Law now includes a clause regarding persons “setting up or managing casinos overseas, or others they appoint [who] organize and solicit citizens of the [People’s Republic of China] to go abroad and participate in gambling.” 

If wagering by these individuals lured abroad “is huge or there are other serious circumstances,” those who lured or organized their activities will face a prison sentence of between 5-10 years, along with unspecified fines. The new law will officially take effect on March 1, 2021.  

This year was a great one for poker in many ways, as despite the difficulties faced by the industry on the back of the Coronavirus outbreak, players embraced an online culture and played in some of the biggest events that have ever taken place in poker history.

One such event was the World Series of Poker Main Event… or was it? Because in the midst of the 85 WSOP bracelets events in the 2020 World Series of Poker Online Series, was a $5,000 re-entry Main Event. No-one was told there would be another one, no-one had any clue of the Hybrid drama to come.

Especially not Stoyan Madanzhiev.

The Bulgarian won the WSOP Main Event and took home $3.9 million by doing so – the largest online poker prize in history.