A HEREFORD poker champion has played his way to the game of his life - on board a Caribbean cruise ship.

Kiegan Vallely has been playing Texas Hold'em poker for seven years and won a place on a Ladbrokes Poker Cruise during an online game.

Mr Vallely, from Kings Acre, finished in the top nine of a game for 98 players, allowing him to enter a larger game.

He then finished in the top three after taking on 678 people, meaning he had won a dream holiday and a chance to play at the ship's Poker Festival.

The festival's main game carries a jackpot of around £250,000 but Mr Vallely and his girlfriend Jenny Orum are already winners as their entry fee, flights and food are all being paid for.

"Even about 65th place pays about five grand," he said. "The only thing we have to pay for on board is the drinks."

Mr Vallely, who is partially deaf, had worked at Stretton Sugwas Primary School signing to a five-year-old with a cochlea implant, but both he and Miss Orum are due to start university in Eastbourne in September.

For now, though he is getting in some practice. "I play most weeks at Karlo's in Hereford, which averages around 40 people. I need all the practice I can get reading poker faces."

Mr Vallely added that, although people from all over Europe had entered the online tournament, a player from just a few miles away in Worcester had also finished in the top three - and he would be meeting him in New York for one last practice session before the cruise departed.