Poker ace: Shrewsbury's Tom takes his winnings past £1 million mark
A university dropout from Shrewsbury, who turned his hand to poker, has won more than £1 million in prize money.
Tom Hall is celebrating his latest win after taking the title in a major tournament against some of the best players in the world.
The 28-year-old triumphed in the 888Live Festival London Main Event, picking up the title, trophy and a mouth-watering £78,888.
He battled through 427 entries in the three-day competition held in London and took on 27-year-old Ning Lu in a game which finally ended at 4.30am on Tuesday morning.
The full time poker player faced an uphill battle as he had half the number of chips as his opponent but admits he felt in control and was confident his wider experience would pay off.
To date he has won more than £1 million in tournament prize money, with his biggest payday being the £173,000 he picked up in Prague last December, when he again came out ahead of a formidable line-up of top players.
And he is not the only winner – his parents, Sharon and Martin, and younger brother Adam, will be getting a slice of his winnings.
"It is nice for me to be able to win it for them," he said. "They don't play poker but they are totally supportive of what I do."
But it was not all plain sailing for Tom, who dropped out of his studies at Nottingham Trent University after failing his first-year exams not once but twice.
He said: "I took maths but failed my end of year exams. So I restarted. This time I studied maths and computing. But when I failed again, I knew university wasn't for me and dropped out. I had begun to play online poker and was getting good results.
"Since then it has become my life and I absolutely love the game."
The main event at the 888Live Festival London boasted a £427,730 prize pool and brought to an end the 11-day event which attracted some of the game's leading players, including 32-year-old Chris Moorman, the world's most successful online poker player who has won £15 million in prize money.
Chris said: "Tom has been one of the most consistent hard-working grinders in the UK for a while now. It was great to see him take down the 888Live Festival London Main Event and I enjoyed commentating on the Final Table and watching his play."
