Anthony Bloom | Tony Bloom | The Lizard

He named his sports betting consultancy Starlizard after his nickname The Lizard; he got that due to his ice cool poker face. One of his most interesting businesses Starlizard uses technology and mathematics to give better odds to its members. Starlizard is said to go to the nth degree in factoring in a predicted score. The weather, player morale among other influencing factors. 

Bloom also owner of Brighton & Hove Albion (his birthplace football team) and Royale Union Saint-Gilloise of Belgium, he has a passion for football- for sure. 

Like some other pro gamblers Tony has made great success from combining maths and computers to help win at gambling. In further coincidence those same peers also were investors and businessmen. 

The start 

Tony was born on the south coast of the UK in a town called Brighton in 1970. His grandfather used to enjoy a bit of a flutter at the dogs (Greyhound racing) but nothing serious. He would take Tony when he was very young. Tony also spent a few quid at the arcades; he must have loved the thrill. 

It was at 15 that he started gambling himself at betting shops (known locally as bookies in the UK). 15 is and was an illegal age for gambling in the UK so he used a fake ID. 

He continued to diligently study maths realising the power of the subject from a young age. There is also clearly a love of it shown throughout his strategic life. He went on to Manchester and got a degree in maths. 

Following his student days he got his first job with Ernst and Young as an accountant. This alongside his betting wins built up a roll of some £20k a very nice respectable sum at the time. As an options trader though he lasted just 6 months, deciding to stop trading his time for money and moving into gambling as a profession. 

The Oriental Connection 

The next poignant moment was when Victor Chandlers (Bet Victor) the bookmakers noticed his talent for picking a winner. He had been winning from them no doubt! But he needed a big offer to make him give up being a pro. As head of a setup for Asian operations the position must have appealed to the entrepreneur in him too; as he took it. Now he was working for a bookmaker and learning Asian handicapping whilst living an international lifestyle. One notable win for The Lizard was instructing Victor Chandler to give France favourable odds to win the 1998 world cup final. Tony knows football, as the unfancied Frenchmen stormed to victory over Brazil 3-0. This is said to have made Chandlers a lot of money. But besides that it showed the world his talent for knowing the game of football. 

Ever the entrepreneur his first startup called Premier Bet was the first online to use the Asian Handicapping System. It was a great success and he sold the business later on. Hungry for more Tony saw the rise of the internet and being well placed was able to get in on online gambling websites. Part of the rise of online gambling was from the success of Chris Moneymaker - it was boom time. 

Taking his money from selling Premier Bet, Bloom saw the opportunity to reinvest and invigorate himself! Tony started two online poker sites, St Minver and Tribeca Tables. 

Poker 

Coming back to Chris M and Poker for a second Tony loves a game of poker. A true gambler at heart- “Poker gives you a good grounding in lots of things, including reading situations and reading people and making tough decisions. Those skills can be used in business and certainly in running a football club,” -Tony Bloom 

Starlizard 

The profits of this company are not known exactly but it’s huge numbers. It portrays itself as a betting consultancy agency. With 2 string services for those that can afford it. But if you can you may be in luck for the consultancy purportedly earns 100 million a year average. 14 million is made alone from the subscriptions to the information per year. If you visit the website of Starlizard you will see integrity is everywhere. Secrecy is very important when you consider that estimated annual wagered amounts can be a round 3 billion per year. 

Tony though remains a very likeable man and is a dad to his son, married to an Australian woman he lives a private life and looks after his businesses and employees well. After a long tenure they are allowed access to Starlizards services. He seldom flaunts his billions but is known to throw a wild party now and again.

It's worth noting that Tony Bloom has an interest in horse racing and many have been the feature of informed gambles. 

One horse worth a mention is Penhill, who was trained by Willie Mullins, a dual Cheltenham Festival winner in the Albert Bartlett Novices' hurdle (2017) & the Stayer's Hurdle (2018). He was retired in 2020 after pulling up when battling to retain his crown in the Stayer's Hurdle AT Prestbury Park. In his Flat and NH career he achieved 12 wins from 34 starts. He was a talented Flat horse with James Bethell and Luca Cumani, achieving a highest official rating of 100 and total earning (Flat) of £59,025. However, this son of Mount Nelson excelled on the National Hunt, achieving 7 wins from 16 starts. He won price money of £412,377. A highest official rating (NH) of 165 proved his class. A true champion.

 

Other exceptionally talented horses in the ownership of Bloom include Librisa Breeze, trained by Dean Ivory, who won over £1M in prize money. Withhold, trained by Roger Charlton, who has won over £400,000 in total earnings. 

Professional Gamblers: Telly Savalas Poker Player

Born in Garden City, New York in 1924, Aristoteles 'Telly' Savalas will always be best remembered – at least, by readers of a certain age – for his portrayal of the bald, lollipop sucking title character in the television series 'Kojak', which aired on CBS during the Seventies. However, it is somehow fitting that 'Kojak' is used, nowadays, to describe a starting hand of king-jack in Texas Hold'em poker because Savalas was, in his time, a highly accomplished exponent of the game. 

By his own admission, Savalas 'gambled from day one on the streets of New York.' In 1969, while filming 'On Her Majesty's Secret Service' – in which he played villain Ernst Blofeld – he incurred the wrath of producer Harry Saltzman when he fleeced Bond star George Lazenby of his daily living expenses during a late-night poker game that he had organised for the cast and crew. Saltzman gatecrashed the game, won back the money and warned Savalas against any further exploitation of the Australian actor. 

Savalas made his first appearance in the World Series of Poker (WSOP) in 1985, at the age of 61, purportedly to research an upcoming film role as professional gambler Nick 'The Greek' Dandolos. Whatever his motivation, Savalas enjoyed early success, finishing third of 149 entrants in a $1,000 Limit Seven-Card Stud Hi/Lo event at Binion's, Las Vegas and cashing for $14,900. Suitably inspired, he stumped up the ante for the $10,000 No Limit Texas Hold'em World Championship at the same venue two weeks later. He did not last long, though; after just an hour or two of the four-day-long tournament, Savalas bet the last $3,500 of his dwindling stack all-in on a jack-high straight and lost to a queen-high straight.

Undeterred, Savalas continued to play in WSOP tournaments from time to time. In 1987, he finished fifth in a $1,000 Seven-Card Stud Split event, again at Binion's, and cashed for $11,650. In 1992, he enjoyed a much better run at the $10,000 No Limit Hold'em World Championship, finishing 21st of 201 entrants and cashing for $8,080. With total live earnings of $40,630, Savalas hardly set the poker world on fire, but once confessed, 'My excitement is seeing the characters around this poker game.You wouldn't believe who they are.'

Savalas' fondness for gambling was not lost on the admen from Player's Club International, who had him reprise his 'Kojak' catchphrase 'Who loves ya, baby?' after a fashion, by pitching the phrase 'It's bonus time, baby' in a series of late-night television advertisements during the Eighties. Savalas also witnessed the Las Vegas debut of a youthful Phil Hellmuth Jr. – who, in 1989, became the youngest ever winner of the WSOP Main Event – when the 'Poker Brat' took a seat next to him at a $30/$60 Seven-Card Stud 8 table in the Dunes poker room for the first time.

Professional Gamblers: Who is Dave ''Devilfish'' Ulliott?

The late Dave 'Devilfish' Ulliott, who died from bowel and liver cancer, at the age of 61, in 2015, was one of the most distinctive and influential British poker players in history. Born in Kingston upon Hull, East Yorkshire in 1954, Ulliott left school at 15 and drifted into a life of petty crime. Indeed, he was twice detained at Her Majesty's pleasure in his twenties, before turning to poker as a more 'legitimate' means of making a living. That said, he spent the formative years of his new career travelling around seedy, often illegal, back rooms in the Midlands and the North of England, where he cultivated the aggressive, egotistical image that would become his trademark. 

His path inevitably led to London and, later, to Las Vegas where, in April 1997, he became just the third Englishman to win a World Series of Poker (WSOP) bracelet – not to mention $180,310 in prize money – in the $2,000 Hold'em Pot Limit event at Binion's. Other notable paydays in his professional career, which spanned four decades, included $589,175 for winning the World Poker Tour (WPT) $10,000 + 100 No-Limit Hold'em Championship at Horseshoe Casino & Hotel in Tunica, Mississippi in January 2003 and $674,500 for a third-place finish in the WPT $15,000 + 400 Doyle Brunson Classic – No-Limit Hold'em at Bellagio, Las Vegas in December 2007. Indeed, Ulliott accrued $6,235,521 in total live earnings, at a time when poker prize money was a fraction of what it is today and was, for many years, the highest-earning British poker player ever. 

Ulliott was originally christened 'Devilfish' by fellow poker player Stephen Au-Yeung, who likened him to the potentially deadly Japanese delicacy, otherwise known as 'blowfish' or 'pufferfish', during a private game at his home. However, the moniker was resurrected during a rowdy, heads-up contest against Men 'The Master' Nguyen at Four Queens Hotel & Casino, Las Vegas in January 1997; Ulliott won and the following day the local newspaper celebrated his first major tournament win under the headline 'Devilfish Devours The Master!'

Domestically, Ulliott participated in and won, the inaugural series of 'Late Night Poker' – the pioneering television programme that introduced the hole card camera – on Channel 4 in 1999. Aside from his extraordinary skill as a poker player, his slicked-back hair, sharp, pin-striped suit and tie, orange-tinted glasses and two enormous gold rings, bearing the legends 'Devil' and 'Fish', respectively, made Ulliott the star of the show and a household name in Britain. Many years later, reflecting on his career, he said, 'I’ve realised that no matter what happens, nobody can break me inside. A good player can’t have nerves. I lost mine a long time ago.' 

Ulliott last cashed in a live poker tournament in the WSOP $1,500 No-Limit Hold'em – Monster Stack event at Rio All-Suite Hotel & Casino, Las Vegas in June 2014, less than a year before his death. On that occasion, he collected $6,368 for finishing 265th of 7,862 entries. However, during the WSOP Main Event, at the same venue, in July 2017, it was announced that Ulliott had been posthumously inducted into the Poker Hall of Fame for 'his role in growing the game in England'.

If you want to learn more about Dave Devilfish Ulliott I have read and would recommend his publication: Devilfish: The Life & Times of a Poker Legend (2010). 

Review: 

 

Being from Hull and an avid poker player/fan this book was a must. It has always been on my list of books to buy, but after learning of Mr Ulliots untimely death it jumped straight to the front of the queue. It's well known that people from Hull are a little rough around the edges (not William Wilberforce, I'm talking about Dean Windass & John Prescott). The devilfish was raised on a run-down council estate with little chance of success, somehow amassing a fortune of £30 million, and all through playing cards. One of pokers greatest ever characters and a true talent. His story is full of jaw-dropping anecdotes that will leave you amazed. R.I.P Mr.Devilfish, you bloody legend!

Rober Hemingway.

The Devilfish | Poker Documentary | Full Length

Read this post: Comedy Moments from Devilfish, Dave Ulliott, British Poker Legend