Irish Masters 2010 Won By Nicholas Newport

Dublin’s Nicholas Newport has won the Irish Masters 2010, after defeating a field of 347 players over three days to take down the title, and collect the €125,000 ($174,605) first place prize.
The €1,650 No Limit Hold’em tournament took place at the Burlington Hotel in Dublin and included a whole host of pros and amateurs, as well as invited VIP’s from the snooker world Mark Williams, Mathew Stevens and Dennis Taylor.
Also there were 105 Paddy Power online qualifiers, the best of which was Slovenian Tomaz Kogovsek, who finished in 18th place and picked up a €20,000 prize package for being the Paddy Power Sole Survivor.
Despite keeping a low profile for the first two days of the competition, Nicholas Newport came into his own on the final day’s play. Patiently growing his chip stack and then topping the leaderboard, Newport eventually saw Tom Finneran eliminated in 3rd (€56,500) to force heads-up play against fellow Irishman Charlie Harvey.
Nicholas Newport held a sizable chip lead over his opponent as the battle commenced, but it still took around an hour before the decisive hand was played with all the money going to the centre of the table on the flop.
Charlie Harvey had made two pair to Newport’s spade flush draw, but a 4s on the river finally sealed Harvey’s fate, who collected €77,000 for his deep run in the tournament.
In the meantime, Nicholas Newport was crowned the Irish Masters 2010 Champion and took down his biggest score to date of €125,000 ($174,605) for his hard fought efforts.
As the Irish Winter Festival drew to a close, PaddyPowerPoker’s Communications Manager declared:
“This year’s Irish Winter Festival was better than ever before and has definitely established itself as one of Europe’s most prestigious tournaments with over €500,000 in the main event prize pool…I am already looking forward to the Irish Open 2011 as I know we can expect just as much craic and entertainment at this event!”