$10,000 buy-in sponsored by the British Columbia Lottery Corporation

The British Columbia Lottery Corporation announced sponsorship of the $10,000 buy-in to this year’s World Series of Poker main event for Vancouver Canucks hockey star Roberto Luongo confirming its reputation of the online gambling pioneer.

Well-know for being the first Canadian provincial government to launch online gambling operations, Britsh Columbia already saw BCLC cooperate with Luongo who represents its Playnow.com poker and casino games website at a number of gaming events.

Famous poker player already took part in the NHL Charity Shootout at the World Series of Poker in Las Vegas in 2009.

In a statement given Thursday night, Kim Steinhart, BCLC’s senior public affairs officer, said:

ldquo;Businesses commonly partner with celebrities or sports figures to help strengthen their brand image. Roberto Luongo is an well-known celebrity in our marketplace, and a natural fit for this type of a marketing approach.rdquo;

ldquo;The partnership provides BCLC with an opportunity to build the PlayNow.com brand by providing our customers with an opportunity to interact in a meaningful way with a well-known sports celebrity. The money for Luongo’s agreement is part of BCLC’s annual marketing budget and has no impact on revenue that flows through to the province,rdquo; he concluded.

The WSOP main event field has not yet been finalised, but Luongos participation has been confirmed by the World Series of Poker spokesman Seth Palansky on Thursday.

Pius Heinz of Germany won the last years main event taking home more than $8.7 million and a gold bracelet and leaving behind the field of 6,865 entrants from 85 countries.

The kick-off of this year’s main event is scheduled for Saturday and final table clashes are expected around July 16 before adjourning until October 28 in order to to avoid the US presidential elections fuss in November.