Online poker room PokerStars announced that its team of brand ambassadors will be joined by 24-year-old Japanese model and actress Yuiko Matsukawa. She will promote the game of poker as a skill-based one across Japan.
Matsukawa is the third Japanese to be sponsored by PokerStars. Previously, the cardroom has signed similar deals with Naoya Kihara, Japan’s first poker player to win a WSOP bracelet, as well as Kosei Ichinoise, who is known to be a Team PokerStars Pro Online.
Under her deal with the popular poker brand, Matsukawa will need to attend various poker-related events, tournaments included, and to promote the game as one that requires certain skills rather than luck. Actually, she could be seen at the latest edition of the Macau Poker Cup, which was held at the PokerStars LIVE Macau earlier in March.
The involvement of a Japanese resident, and a particularly popular one, points to PokerStars’ intention to popularize poker on the territory of the country and in Asia, as a whole.
Eric Hollreiser, Director of Corporate Communications for the poker room as well as its parent company Amaya Inc., commented that Matsukawa is “an exciting celebrity” who, as it seems, is keen on playing poker. Mr. Hollreiser said that they are looking forward to working with her, as she will certainly help his company promote poker as a game that is based on skills and not that much on luck.
He also pointed out that PokerStars has always been championing the game around the world and is happy to be responsible for its popularization across Japan.
Matsukawa shared that she was really happy to be given the opportunity to take part in the Macau Poker Cup as a PokerStars ambassador. She promised that she will do her best to “brush up [her] skills”
Matsukawa has joined PokerStars’ roster of sponsored celebrities, with tennis star Rafael Nadal, former soccer player Ronaldo, and poker pro Daniel Negreanu being among those.
Recently, one of the world’s most popular poker rooms announced that player Jason Somerville would join its Team PokerStars Pro. Somerville is known to have been streaming the so-called “Run it UP!” series on Twitch for quite some time now. His channel has more than 4 million unique views and more than 70,000 followers.
What is more, PokerStars launched its own Twitch channel, which is to feature streams from Team PokerStars Pro members as well as other poker-related content.
