The increase in popularity of poker gambling at our online casinos has been well documented, and poker has become the casino game of choice for a large number of the new online casino customers. Online poker is of course available in many forms, ranging from simple draw poker played against the house, to the community card poker formats for the more adventurous. By far the most popular of the community card poker games is Texas Hold’em, which is the format commonly played in almost all the poker tournaments around the world including the Irish Open. Texas Hold’em is not a casino game for the feint hearted, particularly when played in the online poker forums which pitch online poker players against each other. Texas Hold’em poker is undoubtedly a casino game which requires a level of skill and experience to be successful, and the number of betting rounds associated with each hand usually results in large pots and increasing risk as the game progresses. We have detailed the rules of Texas Hold’em poker in our casino games pages which we hope will provide an introduction to this form of online poker for new online casino customers not familiar with the game, but there is no substitute for experience when it comes to playing Texas Hold’em for real. Each player is dealt two cards face down and five community cards are then dealt one at a time face up in the middle of the table. Each player will then make their best 5-card poker hand from the seven cards available to them at the showdown. There is a betting round before the community cards are dealt and a further betting round after each of these community cards is dealt, giving players the opportunity to fold or play at each stage. The most important thing to remember when starting to play Texas Hold’em poker is that your initial stake can increase substantially during a game before the showdown, and there is a danger that small budgets can be swallowed up very quickly. Nevertheless, Texas Hold’em is one of the most exciting casino games to play.