Phil Ivey, dubbed the Tiger Woods of poker, is suing Britain’s oldest casino, Crockfords, for withholding his £7.8 million payout has admitted he did win the cash by ‘reading’ the cards by using a legitimate technique called ‘edge sorting’.
The biggest legal battle in casino history, is due to be heard later this year.
On his visit to Crockfords August 20th 2012, Phil Ivey was accompanied by a an attractive Chinese woman known as Kelly, whose speciality is to ‘identifying the design flaws’.
Phil made various requests for decks of cards to be changed at the end of hands until Kelly identified a deck or decks of cards where the pattern on the reverse side of the cards was asymmetrical (one side longer than the other).
Kelly, speaking Cantonese to the Chinese dealer, would ask the dealer to reveal each card in turn by lifting the edge furthest from the dealer so that Kelly could identify whether the card was a seven, eight, or nine – the key cards in punto banco (baccarat).
The first time that Kelly identified a key card, she told the dealer that it was a 'good' card which she wanted the dealer to rotate in the opposite direction to all the other cards and the dealer complied with the request so the long edges of the key card became distinguishable from those of the other cards.
Over the course of time, the cards in the deck were orientated so that “good” and “bad” cards faced in the opposite direction. So later, practically anyone would be able to recognise the key cards and bet accordingly.
Initially, Phil was betting £50,000 a hand but, having edge sorted the cards, he asked the casino’s permission to raise the maximum stake to £150,000. He says that casinos frequently accede to advantage players’ special requests because they do not want to deter them from playing.
After two days of play and a £7.8 million lead, Phil cashed out and Crockfords, the oldest private gaming club in the world, initially agreed to transfer his winnings to his bank account, but has returned only his £1million stake so far.
The casino is owned by Genting, a Malaysian gaming corporation, which sent investigators to London to question employees and scrutinise hours of CCTV footage. However, Mayfair club Crockfords believes he ‘operated a scam’ and claims he ‘acted to defeat the essential premise of the game’ – and is refusing to hand over his winnings of US$12.4 million!
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