Almost 18 months since WGM broke the news that Chinese police had raided the APPT Nanjing Millions and arrested organizers, a new Asian-based poker tournament series is preparing to move back in with a debut $500,000 Guaranteed event to be held in Beijing this month.
The Asia Poker League has announced it will host APL Beijing in the Chaoyang Qu district, an eight day poker festival boasting a full 10-event schedule. It is the first time we’ve seen any sort of push to take tournament poker back to the mainland since Nanjing, which proved a huge setback for China’s rapidly growing poker scene.
Underground poker clubs have been operating in China’s major cities for years but rule number one has traditionally been to stay off the government’s radar.
But in an interview with our good friends at Somuchpoker, APL boss Judic Kim said his event differs from APPT Nanjing which attracted too much attention due to the number of players and the decision to make it a re-buy tournament.
“Poker is not legally black or white in China,” he said. “Once I visited China and looked over all of the country, I saw that there are so many different types of sizable tournaments which are running. When we think about a big tournament, it actually isn’t that big in China.
“There are so many US$100,000 Guaranteed tournaments running everywhere. The problem is that in the past, the Nanjing Millions was cancelled by the Chinese government.
“It makes a lot of foreign players ask questions about our events. There are a couple of facts that created that problem. Once a tournament is running in China, a host must give all the information to the government such as tournament schedule, buy-in, etc.
“What happened was, so many players came to play the Nanjing Millions and organizers didn’t expect that many, so they broke the rules and made the tournament an unlimited re-buy tournament.
“Anyway, the interest of poker in China is just massive, and the business is growing steadily. So this series will be the starting point of booming poker in Asia, and the purpose of hosting the event is that we want to make a combined community.”
Police raid the APPT Nanjing Millions in April 2015
The event will be held at the Beijing Poker Club, which ironically hosted the successful APPT Beijing Millions event in 2014 – nine months before the drama in Nanjing.
“China is a very attractive country,” Kim told Somuchpoker. “Playing cash games is illegal in China but many underground poker rooms are running. It has been only five years since Texas Hold’em got popular in China, but I personally believe that they have the potential for the biggest poker tournament fields outside of the US.
“Though China is a really big country, there are so many local tournaments running, and local players easily share the information. Tournaments in China will be gigantic.”
It’s certainly a brave experiment by Kim, who like many before him recognizes poker’s undoubtedly enormous potential in China. We can only wish him luck.
