We have our champion - Peter Gunnarson from Sweden!


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WHU Update No. 17

Now that today's action starts in the evening instead of the afternoon, both the players and the crew have gotten a bit of time to visit some of the many beautiful places in Barcelona. It's truly a city to fall in love with! I did my usual walk starting at Placa de Catalunya, over the Ramblas, and then along the seaside towards the casino, thereby checking out the illegal CD's and the fake designer glasses that are offered, saying hi to other tourists, and in general just enjoying every minute that I spend here. With all these beautiful people and the -as always- superb weather it is easy to forget why we are actually here though: work - hard work.

After seven days of matches we have reached the final of this great World Heads Up event. A sold-out venue, 128 players maximum, all of whom have ponied up the €2,000 buy-in. From these 128 people, two have remained: Simon Nowab from England and Peter Gunnarson from Sweden. Not the people we would have expected here maybe, but hey - they have deserved it. In fact, Simon had actually fought his way back into two consecutive matches where he was almost dead and buried, to then fight his way into the semi-finals and beat his very own friend and teacher John Falconer. And even though I have been a bit critical about Peter's play from time to time because in my view he does not adapt well enough to the changed circumstances when he actually has a big lead, he has booked some impressive wins here, beating players of great fame like Pascal Perrault and Dave Colclough. All in all, we have an exciting final ahead of us, and I will try to analyze things as well as possible. The match has started at 7:30 p.m. local time, both players holding 320,000 and the blinds and limits doubled again as opposed to yesterday.



FINAL
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+++ Peter Gunnarson* (Sweden) - Simon Nowab (England) TT (1h13)

With blinds of 3,000 and 6,000, the first pot was a big one right away: about 80,000, or well over 12% of the total chips in play. With four spades on the board, Peter had check-called 18,000 on the river against Simon who had been betting all the way. The Swede's six of spades was good against the Englishman's two pair. But then Simon won three decent-sized pots, including one where Peter paid off Simon's 15K runner-runner flush bet, and Simon also caught Peter bluffing once with again four of a suit on the board, when Peter had nothing more than a six-high (and Simon won with second pair). He had a slight lead then, but gave it away immediately when Peter had A3 and made aces up on the river, getting paid off 15K.

On a flop KT7, and a raised pot, Simon had raised Peter's 25K bet to 75K, and with the Swede unable to call him, Simon now has close to 60% of the chips. But then things started to turn sour for the man from Burnley. Peter had limped on the small blind / button (SBB) and then had reraised Simon's initial 26,000 raise - and the Englishman had to release. And he then even lost a massive pot, when he paid off 20K, 40K and 60K against Peter's ten-eight of clubs, for a flush made on the turn. After 35 minutes of play, the chip count was even 455K-185K in favor of the Swede, but just before the first break Simon has fought back to about 250,000.

And it was almost even stacks when in a raised pot, Simon check-raised his opponent's 30K bet to make him lay down his hand. Almost even... but not quite. When on a flop K52 with two diamonds Simon flatcalled a 12K bet, it seemed both to my neighbor in the audience John Falconer and to me that Simon probably had a big hand. And when after Peter's 35K bet on the turn Js Simon immediatey said "All-in" (to about 295K), we were sure he had a big hand. But after about five minutes of deliberation, it turned out Peter had read his opponent better than we had, and called with a mere king-ten. Simon had a king-six with nothing extra, and was drawing very thin. So, when a ten appeared on the river and it turned out that Peter had him covered, the match was over. The champion: Peter Gunnarson, a young Swede who had played in a somewhat Zen-state of mind all week, in a very smooth rhythm, and who when it mattered most found the calmness to come up with the correct decision. Congratulations to this young man - the 2005 World Heads Up champion.

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WHU Update No. 16

The two semi-finals are over, and the two relative underdogs are through. Despite their large experience, and the fact that they were odds-on favorites, both Dave Colclough and John Falconer have lost their matches. This means tomorrow's final will be between Peter Gunnarson from Sweden and Simon Nowab from England; now those of you who had predicted that, could have won a lot of money. Make sure you tune in tomorrow at 7 p.m local time, for the finals of the 2005 World Heads Up. Bye for now - see you all tomorrow!

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WHU Update No. 15

We are into the final stages of the event! All remaining players have already locked up 20 grand, and will be battling today for the honors, the trophy, and a cool 100,000 Euros. Matches include the battle between two long-time friends from Burnley, Simon Nowab & John Falconer, and the match between one of the top favorites "El Blondie" Dave Colclough against the Swedish surprise Peter Gunnarson. Players will start with 160,000 now, and the limits and blinds will simply be twice as much as in the previous days, meaning the stack / blind ratio will stay the same. Prize money so far:

€3,250 (last 16) Stephen Pearce, Simon Trumper, Raul Paez Corral, Jamie Sharrat, Jac Arama, Frej Rutenskold, Jin Cai Lin, Paul Jackson
€10,000 (quarter-finalists) Pascal Perrault, Andreas Hagen, David Leigh, Peter Abela
€20,000 (semi-finalists) John Falconer, Dave Colclough
€50,000 (runner-up) Simon Nowab
€100,000 (winner) Peter Gunnarson

I will try to provide you with fast an accurate updates of both semi-finals, and then the final will be tomorrow. Enjoy!

SEMI-FINALS
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Because of a change in the schedule, we will have the Burnley boys first. Their match has started at 4:15 p.m. local time.

+++ Peter Gunnarson (Sweden)* - Dave Colclough (UK) TT (1h46)

The strong Dave Colclough suffered from losing a big pot right at the beginning of this match, when his opponent had flopped a straight. Even though he was quickly down to about 90,000 in chips, Dave went back in his usual routine of playing small pots, trying to chip away at his opponent. But then with a flop 763 with two clubs, he lost yet another pot when he had to release his hand when Peter came over the top of his 15,000 raise. After about 25 minutes of play, El Blondie was again down to 82,000, with the young Swede in control. And after losing the two consecutive (small) pots as well, his stack was even down at 65K. The big favorite just couldn't seem to win a pot. Barely 45 minutes into the match, his stack had shrunk to a miserable 35,000, with Peter holding an impressive stack of 285,000. It seemed we could be in for a massive upset.

But then Peter started to make the (at least in my view) same mistake as he did in previous his match against Pascal Perrault: He let his opponent get back into the match without forcing him to show a hand. On two occasions, the Swede had made a decent raise, and then decided to fold to a reraise - with Dave holding less than 15% of the total chips in play, meaning that even after losing the Swede would still be in clear command. I think that Peter should have gone for the gamble and taken the chance to knock out this dangerous player, because the longer Dave will stay in the match, the better he will be at grinding you down. Not much later, Dave actually got a great chance to double up when the money went in on the turn, both players had K7 for second pair, but the man from Wales was freerolling with a hearts flush draw. It didn't come, and after another splitpot when both players were all-in with the same hand (big slick), we are into the first break with a chip count 257K-63K.

And the second hour started out very badly for Dave. Despite the fact that Peter allowed Dave to see a lot of flops, he couldn't profit from this by winning many pots. In fact, he lost a whole lot of pots! And when after having raised himself to 12K, he had to release against Peter's all-in raise, he was back at less than 30,000 again. On the final hand, Dave first flatcalled a 10,000 raise and then bet into his opponent on the flop Q54 with a mere K9 (he knew that Peter was rather reluctant to call all-in bets with little, so this was indeed probably the best course of action), but Peter had flopped a pair with his K5 and called him- meaning Dave was drawing to a nine only. It didn't come, and we have the Swede Peter Gunnarson in tomorrow's final.

+++ John Falconer (UK) - Simon Nowab* (UK) TT (0h51)
An interesting match? Yeah, that's for sure. These two players are long-time friends, and have over the years shared almost all of their wins and losses - not just in poker, but also in regular gambling games like roulette that they used to play. Interesting also because in Simon's view "John has taught me everything that I know now. When I started, I just loved to play, but actually I did not have much of a clue. It was my Burnley friend who has helped me, because without him I would have still have played as badly as I did back then." So, one could claim that when Simon would win today's match, that it is a classic case of Student beating the Teacher.

And in fact after about twenty minutes The Edge had won two small pots to take a slight lead over Burnley John, in a match where both players claim that they "just don't care who wins this first match - what is important that this winner will also win the second one." But after losing a 75K pot, where Simon check-raised John's 7,000 river bet to 24,000 but couldn't beat his opponents top pair / top kicker, he was again trailing a little. When John then couldn't call big bets by Simon in three pots (twice on the turn, one time on the river), Simon had his friend down to 99,000. And then the following hand developed. On the small blind / button (SBB), Simon just called the 3,000, and when John raised to 9,000 from the big blind, Simon came over the top for 24,000 total. But John had a good hand too, pocket sevens, and decided to reraise once more, all-in to 99,000. No surprises on the board, and we have our second finalist in Simon "The Edge" Nowab.