When I first started playing poker, in 1999, so few British players had ever won a World Series of Poker (WSOP) bracelet, you could count them on one hand. There were as many British WSOP bracelet winners in 2024 alone than there were in the first 36 years of the Series combined! The first was won by Dave ‘Devilfish” Ulliot in 1997, but the Brits have exceeded ever since, with 71 winners to date.
Remarkably, even with six bracelet winners, 2024 wasn’t even the best year overall for British players, as seven had been victorious in 2021, although five of those were awarded online. There are more bracelet events than ever before in 2025, however the year-on-year increase is modest, with just one additional event making the schedule. But this one event is significant, not for what it is, but for the fact that it means for the first time a grand total of 100 bracelets will be awarded at the 2025 WSOP in Las Vegas!
- Read more: 2025 World Series of Poker Schedule Released
Some say it’s too many and the prestige of winning a bracelet has been watered down, but it still features fairly heavily on most live players’ bucket lists. The attendance at the series keeps going up also, suggesting that whether it’s to do with prestige or otherwise, the battle for bracelets will be fierce once again.
Could 2025 Be The Best Year Ever for British Players at the WSOP?
Who will fly the flag for the UK this time? Will Benny Glaser extend his UK record of five bracelets? Will Robert Cowen hunt down his third piece of wrist-wear, or will any of the stars of yesteryear dust off their opening range charts and put themselves back in contention?
Let’s take a look at some of the British players to watch out for at the 2025 World Series of Poker. The first question you always have to ask when it comes to previewing poker events is, who is actually going to be there? This used to be a much easier task, as there were fewer big events on the annual poker calendar. There were also fewer players in general and if you weren’t sure who was going, you’d just ask Neil Channing. He always knew, as he was usually bankrolling half the Brits out there.
But Neil hasn’t been to the Series in a long time and there are now far more players in the UK than even he can afford to keep in make-up. So we must therefore resort to an alternative method of assessing the chances of the Brits at this year’s WSOP, namely, guesswork.
While there are always family occasions such as weddings and births that sometimes keep players away from the WSOP, it is usually assumed that any currently active players who have previously been, will return. This may not be the slam dunk it usually is, as there are rumours that some players are less inclined to visit, under the Trump administration. Whether such protest absences are likely to be a factor remains to be seen, but let’s assume the impact will be minimal.
2024 British Bracelet Winners
First of all, the six British players who claimed success at the 2024 Series. Do any of them look hungry for further success?
Jamie Walden: Jamie Walden won his bracelet in Event #95, the $1,979 NLH Poker Hall of Fame Bounty, for $313,370, in his 4th lifetime cash at the WSOP. After winning his bracelet, Walden had further success in 2024, claiming 3rd place for £30,000 at the 888Poker LIVE Main Event in Manchester, before winning a $1,000 side event at EPT Cyprus for $87,300. The Tisbury resident has had a relatively quiet start to 2025, but is he saving his best for the WSOP?
- Read more: 2024 WSOP: Jamie Walden Wins First WSOP Bracelet in Event #95: $1,979 Poker Hall of Fame Bounty
Richard Ashby: Richard Ashby is one of the most recognisable faces on the UK poker circuit, often found in Pot Limit Omaha cash games and tournaments. He won his second WSOP bracelet in the $1,500 Limit Seven Card Stud, for $113,725. His first came in the same event fourteen years earlier, at the 2010 Series.
Darius Samual: Darius made headlines at the 2024 WSOP, not only winning his first bracelet, but cashing in several others. He also cashed in the WSOPE Main Event and the $25,000 WSOP Paradise Main Event in the Bahamas, where he took 28th place for $180,000. He is yet to grace the prize money at any event in 2025, but an appearance at the 2025 Series seems likely.
Hector Berry: Scotsman Hector Berry’s victory in the $600 PokerNews Deepstack Championship earned him $282,876 and by far the biggest cash in the 11 years he had been playing live poker. Berry, only the second Scot to win a WSOP bracelet, also cashed in the $10,000 Main Event itself, taking 690th for a further $27,500. He has just a couple of cashes so far in 2025, but it would be a surprise not to see him in Las Vegas again this summer.
Ben Collins & Dan Willis: Ben Collins scooped the $500 Salute to Warriors for $207.486 and then booked 266th place in the Main Event for a further $50,000. He’s been inactive on the live circuit evert since, registering just one cash in a local event in Stockton. Dan Willis won the $500 WSOP NLH KickOff for $175,578, which remains his only WSOP cash to-date. Originally from Swindon, he has a several other results since then, all from Las Vegas.
- Read more: 2024 WSOP: Ben Collins Wins Salute to Warriors for $207,486 while Warriors Net $180,680
- Read more: 2024 WSOP: Daniel Willis’ Dream Come True Bracelet Win
High Rollers
Benny Glaser: The British GOAT when it comes to tournament success, both online and live. As well as countless online titles, Glaser is head and shoulders above the rest of the Britpack, with five WSOP bracelets to his name. He may still be well off Hellmuth’s benchmark of 17, but he’s three ahead of any other player from the British Isles. Glaser cashed 14 times at the WSOP in 2024, five of which were final tables. He’s likely to feature in many of the bigger buy-in and mixed games, but does not yet have a bracelet in a Hold’em event.
Stephen Chidwick: Considered to be the best British tournament player ever, Chidwick is a regular on high stakes series like the PokerGO Tour and the Triton Series. With over $64m in lifetime earnings, he sits in third place on the all-time money list. He’s likely to reserve participation for the super high buy-in events and it is in these that he secured his two bracelets to-date, both PLO events, with $25k and $50k price tags.
Ben Heath: Sitting in 25th place on poker’s all-time money list with over $32m in MTT scores, Ben Heath has a blistering set of results on his Hendonmob profile. His second place in the 2024 Triton Million at WSOP Paradise for $8.16m is his biggest cash to date. While he went close in that one, he does have a bracelet to his name, having taken top honours in the $50,000 High Roller in 2019, for just under $1.5m. Ben has made nine final tables out of the 28 WSOP events he has cashed in and is tipped to take that tally into double figures in 2025.
Online Wizards
Chris Moorman: Best known as an online player, but also a highly feared opponent in real life. Moorman is one of the greatest tournament poker players of all time and has been at or near the top of the online rankings for most of the history of online poker. He rose to prominence during the post-Moneymaker boom and has remained there ever since.
Moorman successfully transitioned the skills he honed playing online to also become one of the best live tournament players. He finished 4th in both the 2023 and 2024 WPT World Championship Main Events, cashing for over $2m each time. Overall, he has in excess of $10m in live tournament winnings and likely even more than that on the online felt.
He won his bracelet in 2017 in the $3,000 6-Max for just under half a million dollars. However he was already a WPT Champion by then, having taken down the $10,000 Main Event of the Five Diamond Classic in 2014 for just over $1m. One title that eludes him however is that of a GUKPT Main Event. However, there is one in the family, as Chris’s father Simon Moorman was the 2009 GUKPT Manchester Champion, after Chris bought him in as a birthday treat.
Chris lives in Las Vegas for most of the year and is very likely to feature in the latter stages of many events at the 2025 WSOP.
Patrick Leonard: Another of the UK’s overachievers is one to watch at this year’s World Series of Poker. Leonard has recently re-opened his online poker stable and is always a danger at the tables, online or live. Leonard recently notched up his 21st SCOOP title and cashed ten times at the 2024 WSOP. His sole bracelet came in 2022 in the tag team event, which he partnered with Espen Jorstad, who went on to win the Main Event in the same year.
Headline Acts
Liv Boeree: When not delivering TED talks, Liv still manages to find time to hit the poker room a few times a year. Her most recent outing proved fruitful, as she took fourth place in the $25,000 WSOP Paradise Main Event for a prize so big that even she will have difficulty giving it all away to charity. She won her sole WSOP bracelet in 2017, in a tag team event with her other half, Igor Kurganov. Although she’s unlikely to play the entire series, she is expected to make some sort of appearance and that is often all she needs to make an impression.
Barny Boatman: Over the course of the last year, Barny has warmed to his role as a member of PokerStars’ Team Pro. It’s a role he was always destined for and is well deserved after decades of dedication at the poker tables. He’s still as fierce a competitor as he always has been and it would be no surprise to see him in the mix once again shooting for more bracelets.
Good Shouts
There are so many strong and experienced poker players from the UK that it would be impractical to list them all. Nevertheless, there are a few who catch the eye as ones to watch, players who have had success in the last year or two. These include double bracelet winner Welshman Robert Cowen, an Omaha specialist. Another Rob to watch is Manchester’s Robert Sherwood, who is having a carefree year after finishing runner-up in the WPT World Championship last December, for over $2m.
Many of the regulars on the UK circuit are also expected to make extended visits to Las Vegas this summer, with many chasing their first bracelets. Their number is likely to include Matt Davenport, one of the GUKPT’s most successful regulars. He is usually there or thereabouts at the top of Grosvenor Casinos’ leaderboards and has made more GUKPT final tables than any other player.
Andrew Hulme, another stalwart of the live UK circuit has had a fantastic few months. His good run began last September, when he bagged €1,165,614 for the runner-up spot in the EPT Barcelona Main Event. Since then he’s won the UK Open for £219,720 and made three GUKPT Main Event final tables. Could this be his breakthrough year at the WSOP?
Hector Berry was the sole Scottish bracelet winner in 2024, but the Glaswegian duo of Niall Farrell and Ludovic Geilich will be looking to put themselves in contention this summer. They were the subject of Greg Clark’s award-winning documentary, The Four Rules of the Poker Kings, which aired last year. But they will be on their own this time, without a personal videographer to capture the colloquial and colourful lingo that trips from their tongues, in between hands, or at the bar afterwards.
Old Timers & Blasts From the Past
Jon Shoreman: Jon is someone who is unknown to the majority of today’s player base, but well known to those who were on the scene over twenty years ago. Jon was the owner of the Poker In Europe website, which housed a database of poker results that were used to compile the European rankings. While this ranking system was abandoned around 2010, Jon can still sometimes be seen at the tables. In recent years he has attended the Series, making a few final tables in Omaha and Mixed Game formats. He’s yet to win his first bracelet and it’s long overdue. Perhaps 2025 will be his year?
John Kabbaj: A formidable opponent for over 30 years and still going strong. Kabbaj has numerous wins from the pre-boom era, plus two WSOP bracelets, the first of which came in 2009, in the Pot Limit Hold’em Championship event for $633,335. He followed that up five years later, taking down the $2,500 Omaha/Seven Card Stud Hi/Lo event for $267,327. He’s had a few inactive years, but has been back at the Series for the last few and cashed in last year’s Main Event. Has he still got another big win left in him?
Ian Bradley: Ian ‘At-iT’ Bradley is a player who burst onto the live poker scene in 2005, made a bunch of final tables and then just as quickly burst off the scene, making brief re-appearances here and there, while pursuing a career in i-gaming.
It was not until 2021 that Bradley began to take poker seriously again, cashing four times at the WSOPE in Rozvadov, including a 3rd place finish in the €2,000 PLO for €44,000. In summer 2022 he booked 2nd and 3rd place finishes in consecutive events at EPT Barcelona for over €640,000 combined.
2023 began with making a final table on the Triton Series. He then scooped two titles in the Aria High Roller Series and went deep in the $10,000 Secret Bounty event at the WSOP. But Bradley wasn’t done yet, he was runner up in a bracelet event at the WSOPE and took down the $10,000 8-Max for $240,000 at the WPT World Championship. He doesn’t spend long at the Series, but when he does, he’s capable of making an impact. If he makes an appearance this year, he’s one to watch for sure!
James Dempsey: Like Bradley, Dempsey was one of 2005’s unusual suspects and went on to almost scoop the player of the Series award in 2010, when he won his bracelet, but narrowly missed out on a second. He still plays but these days he’s more likely to be seen behind the scenes, as producer of the Triton Series coverage. He does put in a stint in Las Vegas most summers and it’s likely we will see him again in 2025.
Probably Not Going, But We’d Love To See Them at the WSOP Again
Neil Channing: Former Irish Open winner Neil Channing used to be at the centre of the UK poker scene. He knew everybody, they all owed him money at one point or another, some probably still do. Sadly, he hasn’t been at the WSOP since 2013, although he still makes the odd appearance at poker events in the UK. He is missed and it would be a fine thing to see him once again strutting the corridors, looking for people to sign up to a last longer bet. You never know, stranger things…maybe one day this will happen again!
Ram Vaswani: Once the most feared of TheHendonMobsters, Ram almost went back-to-back in EPT Main Events in the tour’s very first season. He has a bracelet of course and over $3.5m in winnings, but hasn’t been to the WSOP since 2011 and rarely plays live these days. However, he does have a couple of live cashes in 2025 from GUKPT Luton side events, so there’s always hope.
JP Kelly & Praz Bansi: Another two of the UK’s multiple bracelet winners. Praz has been absent from poker for a long time and JP Kelly’s last cash was in 2022. Come back, you’re both missed!
And Then There’s You!
Well, you and your like, as most bracelet winners will be first timers, many are completely unheard of outside their local poker rooms. Maybe next year, you’ll be headlining an equivalent pre-WSOP article and we’ll be assessing your chances of going back-to-back in bracelet events again, repeating the feat you’re about to achieve this year! Huh? Good luck champ-to-be, see you at the cash out desk!
List of Multiple UK Bracelet Winners
Ten players from the UK have won more than one WSOP bracelet, with Benny Glaser leading the way on five. Will more players join this elite club in 2025?
| Player | WSOP Bracelets |
|---|---|
| Benny Glaser | 5 |
| Stephen Chidwick | 2 |
| Richard Ashby | 2 |
| Robert Cowen | 2 |
| John Kabbaj | 2 |
| Barny Boatman | 2 |
| Matt Perrins | 2 |
| Praz Bansi | 2 |
| JP Kelly | 2 |
| John Gale | 2 |
