ShareHigh-stakes tournament legend Adrian Mateos has given a short interview with PokerNews at the EPT Prague, discussing what it’s like for the high roller live scene to be back up and running and telling how he approaches these major events.
Great to Be Back
After so many events were cancelled during the pandemic, Mateos was happy to be back playing in his favourite tour having missed the competition massively.As one of the biggest names in the game, he must have been thinking about all the missed opportunities to make some huge scores. Okay he already has more than $25 million in live tournament earnings but the 27-year-old is clearly hungry for more.
Coming off the back of a victory in the WSOP $ 250,000 No Limit Hold'em - Super High Roller for $3,265,362, Mateos must have been feeling confident as he jumped straight into the biggest events in Prague.
He points out that there has been a lot of news faces arrive into the high roller scene, and also a few familiar names no longer there. The action has all been online throughout the pandemic which has seen new stars born and live tournament specialists sometimes struggle badly.
He aslo points out that the criticism of the younger generation of elite players being like robots is unfair.
"Most of the guys on the High Roller scene are really good guys. Some people call [High Roller players] robots, but that's not fair because they're not. They're just really good players who study a lot, and that's all."
He added that every player capable of competing at this level is working incredibly hard and he must follow suit to be able to maintain his status as one of the game’s very best.
"It can be really hard though. If you want to compete in these Super High Roller tournaments you have to be in the top 20-30 players in the world. It's a small percentage of people that can win at this level, so it's normal that faces can change as not everyone can win. For me it's about the challenge to maintain this status and to be a winning player."
Mateos says he still loves playing poker and enjoys the challenge. When asked if he has any remaining goals in the game he replied that he sees it just like any other job and he simply wants to feel that he’s good at it.
