The European Poker Tour in Vilamoura, Portugal, the new location of the most prestigious roving European tournament, ended on Sunday, November 22. The excitement around poker in Portugal has increased since a Portuguese businessman, Antonio Matias, won the tournament.

At fifty-four years old, Antonio Matias is not a professional poker player. An amateur player specializing in cash games, Matias runs a travel agency. It is the second time in this sixth season of the EPT, that a businessman has won an EPT leg. Just a bit less than a month ago Christophe Benzimra, a French businessman, won the EPT leg held in Warsaw.

Besides being businessmen and not professional players, these two consecutive EPT leg winners are relatively older than players who generally are seen as ambassadors of live poker. Even Antonio Matias’ final heads-up opponent, Pierre Neuville, showed at 67 years that top ranking in the game does not only belong to twenty-year-old players.