World Series 2005 - DAY 1B

*WSOP and World Series of Poker (referred to from now on as the Main Event and/or World Series)

World Series Report by Mad Harper and Brad Willis

At the Main Event, Banned but not bound, Scotsman "Sacrifice" rises to top at the World Series

At the Main Event Day 1b, our eyes settled on the Scotland cap first. It hid his face, stuck out over his eyes, and hung a shadow over his motionless, dour face. We'd heard the stories about him, but weren't sure whether he'd own up to them at the World Series. He called himself Sacrifice online, but all we'd see him do all day long was offer his opponents to the poker gods. He was no sacrifice. He was a retired (banned, actually) card counter, unwelcome in casinos across the pond. Here, Graeme Harrison was welcomed with open arms by PokerStars and feared by his opponents at Day1b of the Main Event.

The softly-spoken Scot, from Penicuik, near Edinburgh, sat at 75,000 with three hours of poker play left to go in his flight. By the end of the night he had more than 140,000. Looking back at last year, 2005 is a considerable improvement. Last year, he fell victim in Level 4 to Dave "Devilfish" Ulliott.

Graeme's gaming career began some ten years ago when he took up blackjack and managed to turn a 500 pounds bankroll into 50,000 in less than six months. Of course, casinos don't like this kind of thing and the puritanical Scots banned him for card counting. Graeme was forced across the border to England but found the casinos in the north-east had the same kind of attitude to card-counting as the ones back home. Migrating slowly south, Graeme finally reached London where he got banned by the Victoria Casino, home to one of Britain's most popular cardrooms. All in all, Graeme reckons he's been banned from some 30 casinos across Great Britain.

Forced out of blackjack, Harrison, now 36, moved on to spreadbetting and finally embarked on poker two years ago - mainly online for obvious reasons. He said: "This is certainly the biggest stack I've had in a big poker tournament, but it's very early days. It doesn't really mean anything at this stage. The ban from the Vic is annoying because I really wanted to play in the British Open but they wouldn't let me in."

Harrison finished the day with a stack bigger than any PokerStars World Series satellite winner yet.

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