November 5, 2002
EUR 220 no-limit hold'em (unlimited rebuys)
Day # 4: Young Swede winner in exciting no-limit hold'em lottery
In contrast to yesterday's high quality, but also a bit slow and tedious, final table, today's action was fast and furious. There was a lot of betting, raising and even re-raising… but not a lot of folding. Even though most hands came down to "let's stick it in and see if I can get lucky", as a result today's final table was one of the most exciting I have ever witnessed. Chip leader Keith Nielsen from England had built his stack just before the final table with about thirteen players left, when he won all-in-before-the-flop confrontations as a favorite (AK vs. A8) and as a small dog as well (KQ vs. A2). With all the fast action that was going on at today's final table, and with the ante and blind pressure relatively high, there was no telling who would end up with the trophy. The strong Steven Liu, who was playing his second consecutive final, seemed like a favorite, but was rather short on chips, and he had an unlucky draw, having to start in the big blind. There were two other familiar faces at this final table: Dani Tanner and Patrick Morgan, two regular players in this casino, and both successful at Saturday night's freeroll tournament, where they won free entries for tomorrow’s no-limit hold'em Main Event. (In addition, I have to mention that it was Patrick Morgan who eliminated the last player on that freeroll, and not Peter Dekker, like I wrote in my daily report. Even though Peter was in the hand, it was Patrick who ended up with the three sixes, not Peter. Sorry for that, Patrick). All in all, it seemed like a close race, where being aggressive and getting lucky would be more important than waiting patiently for the right hand- as there was simply not enough time.
Final table line-up / chip counts:
Seat # 1: Alexander Grolik, Russia, 43,900
Seat # 2: Steven Liu, England, 46,400
Seat # 3: Koray Saka, Sweden, 57,200
Seat # 4: Ömer Cubukcu, Turkey, 55,200
Seat # 5: Keith Nielsen, England, 95,600
Seat # 6: Dani Tanner, Aruba, 46,000
Seat # 7: Martin Pollak, Austria, 29,800
Seat # 8: Chister Johansson, Sweden, 60,600
Seat # 9: Patrick Morgan, England, 70,300
Total chips in play: 505,000 (approx).
All-in betting and raising… and a bit of trapping too
The final table started with a few unusual situations for no-limit hold'em at this stage: multiway pots. First, with antes of 1,000 and the blinds at 2,000 and 4,000, it was Martin Pollak who raised to 12,000. Both Patrick and Alexander Golik from Russia called the raise, and when on the flop it got checked to him Alexander successfully picked up the pot. Then it was Patrick who did another unusual thing at a no-limit hold'em final table, namely limping under the gun, and he got a maximally rewarded for this. With the flop 933 and two hearts, it was Chister Johansson in the big blind, holding a nine and a big heart, who bet out, with Patrick calling. When a third heart came on the turn. Chister made a massive bet, that didn't scare Patrick though. Holding pocket threes and having flopped quads, he couldn’t wait to get all the money in, and he had trapped his opponent in an excellent manner. With Chister out and Patrick holding a big stack now, the action was just about to start. Steven Liu's timing was off when he tried to steal Alexander's blind holding 98 under the gun, but saw Patrick shoving in his entire stack with ace-king. The excellent Steven got a lucky flop though, 882, to stay alive and double through his dangerous opponent. Then it was short-stacked Martin who had to make a move and raised all-in with K8. Chances for him looked rather dim when both Patrick and Steven called his raise and a three-suited flop came, containing an ace on top of that. But as in a miracle, he managed to scoop the pot to stay alive- and be in good shape, even. We lost Turkish player Ömer Cubukcu when Keith called with AQ against Ömer's obvious steal raise, and caught a queen to beat his opponent's Q6 suited for queens up / better kicker. In the meantime, Patrick kept dominating the action. Holding K3 on the button, he decided to raise all-in to take maximum advantage of his large stack. Steven who was in the blind with QJ decided that his hand might be good and, despite being in relatively good chip position, he called his opponent's huge raise. When a king flopped, Steven was out and Patrick was now holding almost 200,000 in chips, showing no signs of wanting to slow down. On hand # 24, he went to battle with the other large stack, Koray Saka from Sweden, with short-stacked Alexander caught in the middle. Koray had built his stack to 140,000 by playing aggressively and winning quite a few small pots, and when he made yet another raise (this time to 50,000) it was Patrick who came over the top for his entire stack. The young Swede had to think for a long time, and finally made the right decision to call, as his AQ dominated both opponents: AJ for Patrick, A8 for Alexander. When a queen flopped, all the chips went over to Koray and Alexander was out. Despite being short-stacked now, Patrick had no intention of waiting for a good hand and maybe move up the ladder one spot at the time, hoping others might bust out. When Keith raised and Dani re-raised all-in, he went all-in for the remainder of his chips (about 60,000) with wired sixes… and flopped a six. Holding pocket fives Dani, who had been playing well all evening, was out and we were down to four-handed in this spectacular and exciting, fast-paced game. At hand # 30, I estimated the chip counts as follows:
Koray 280,000
Keith 35,000
Martin 55,000
Patrick 135,000
The poker roulette continues
With antes of 2,000 and the blinds at 5,000 and 10,000, it was obvious that both Keith and Martin had to make a move fast. Keith stayed alive in an all-in coup against Patrick when his A9 stood up, and Martin stayed alive in a coin flip (holding 88 against Patrick's jack-ten suited), severely crippling the sympathetic Englishman's stack. Unwilling to simply bleed to death, he then decided to go all-in with 65 suited and was busted by Koray’s AQ. Koray also finished off Keith, starting with the worst hand (KT against A5), but getting lucky on the river by catching a ten. We were now heads up with the relatively unknown Koray Saka from Sweden and Martin Pollak, tournament director at the Poker World casino in Vienna, Austria. Both of them had been lucky to get this far by winning almost all of their all-in-before-the-flop gambles, but they had been playing well too. It was Koray who had a huge chip lead over his dangerous opponent and therefore was reluctant to make any kind of deal, and he came out on top in our final all-in gamble. Holding Q8 against Martin’s wired fives, he flopped top two pair, and the tournament was over. We had yet another Scandinavian winner, another young, good and aggressive player- in a tournament that was once again dominated by the foreigners. Congratulations to Koray Saka who, if my information is correct, managed to purchase his ticket only one minute before tournament begin- and got rewarded with a 40,000 Euros first prize.
Some final words
Tomorrow we will start the two-day Main Event, the 3000 Euros no-limit hold'em freeze-out. As always, I will keep you guys posted. Take care, and good luck,
Rolf.
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