EPT Grand Final - Monte Carlo: Day 4 - At A Glance

[Djinn]

Josh Prager takes the brakes off News Now -

Starting the day on 166k, he's up to over 500k now, and picked up the last couple of pots on his table thusly:

He raised under the gun to 30k (blinds 10k/20k) and big blind Johannes Strassmann gave him a spin.  Flop:    Johannes checked, Josh checked.
Turn:    Check, Josh bets 34k, call.
River:    Check, Josh bets a stack of brown 5k chips - looked like 80k, and after a brief pause Johannes called.  He saw the and flipped his cards as the pot was awarded to the American - it looked like a slowplayed Jack which had fallen behind on the Broadway-creating turn.


Two hands later, Simon Johansson raised to 28k preflop, button Samir Rahal called, and it got round to Josh Prager again on the big blind.  He looked at Simon's bet, asked the "Can I see how much you have left?" question, and then just announced "All in."  Quick pass by Simon, but Samir gave it a good think before allowing himself to be successfully squeezed.  Perhaps a Final dark horse?

[Djinn]

Down a Norwegian - Christopher Ulsrud finishes in 25th place (€26,550):

Blind vs. Blind - Steve Jelinek called the small blind and big blind Christopher raised it somewhat (25k), which Steve also called.
Flop:    Steve check-called Christopher's bet of 50k
Turn:    Check from Steve, 90k bet, and then within three seconds Jelinek had check-raised all-in and Christopher had called.
Steve had turned two pair with his , sprinting in front of Christopher's .
River: 

Norwegian blogger Kjetil says that Ulsrud, under the nick LuckyUlsa was the biggest online earner for January...and a chip leader in this for much of the three days' run up to his elimination.  Will probably be seeing a lot more of him.  The details of the story filled in by Ulsrud himself - some rather miffed Norwegians next to us in the press room...

[snoopy1239]

Antony Lellouch -- 410k
Jan Veit -- 195k
Johanes Strassmann -- 120k
Simon Johansson -- 85k
Andy Black -- 515k
Alex Kim -- 560k
Ram Vaswani -- 215k
Philip Hilm -- 300k

[snoopy1239]

Incredibly, we have just lost two players from the aforementioned table. Details to follow...

Johanes Strassmann and Simon Johansson are both OUT.

Hilm raises, Strassmann moves all-in, Johansson calls and so does Hilm (not too much more for him).

Hilm =

Strassmann =

Johansson =

Flop =

Turn =

River =

[Djinn]

After the totally unneccessary three-table redraw, here's the other table we can see's counts:

Carlos Mortensen    520k
Marc Karam            500k
Josh Prager           530k
Roi Elmaliah            170k
Lars Eidissen           110k
Steve Jelinek          950k
Pete Giordano        450k

[NoflopsHomer]

Anthony Lellouche is OUT in 21st place.

He pushed his short stack in with , got called by Alexander Kim's

Board:

[snoopy1239]

The feature table is now made up of:

Dean Sanders
Marc Karam
Eric Van Der Berg
David Peters
Gavin Griffin
Jacob Larsson
Soren Kongsgaard

[Djinn]

The two short stacks on Table Two are sat side by side - but one of them is now not so short - Roi Elmaliah just doubled through:

He made it 36k (out of his 145k total) preflop, and big blind Pete Giordano checked his cards, warning, "If I go all in now I've got a big hand.  All in."
"Call," said Roi, and saw his racing, at least, the .
Flop:    By now the floor is announcing every called all in for the cameras - big TK himself saying, "He needs a Three to stay in the tournament..."
Turn:     Just like that.
River:   

And now Pete is relatively short while 300k is a less desperate stack for Roi.

[Djinn]

The action has indeed slowed considerably.  But once I make the walk from pressroom to tableside, I feel obliged to write stuff down until a hand with some cards shown gets played.  Since Snoopy and Homer are now watching from the rail - here are the standard bits, in descending order of interestingness:

Ram Vaswani (with a 430k stack) raised preflop but let it go when Andy Black made it 120k from the small blind...
Jan Veit makes the same move (except this time all in for his 160k or so) and absorbs a button raise...
Lars Eidissen moves in twice in a row, once on the button for just 78k, then from the cutoff, uncalled both times...
Carlos Mortensen nicks the blinds twice; Jelinek once.

[NoflopsHomer]

18 left now because Lars Eidessen is OUT in 19th. Carlos made it 36k in late position, Josh Praegers re-raised and a short stacked Lars pushed. Carlos got out of the way and Josh called.

Lars:



Josh:



Board:

[snoopy1239]

Andy Black raises it up pre-flop, Ram smooth calls and Phil Hilm re-raises. Black pushed, Ram gets out of the way and Hilm calls, although there is so much in the pot by now I don't think he had much of a decision.

Black =

Hilm =

Flop =

"Philip still needs a 9," explains Big TK in that familiar monotone 'I've done this a squillion times' voice.

Turn =

Andy Black turns away from the table and peers into the distance.

River =

Black swivels round as Kremser announces the River, punches the air and shouts "Yes' uncontrollably.

"That's poker," he says, "He's been making those kind of moves all day. What a play!"

"Nice hand," says a meek Hilm in defeat.

"Thanks," responds a more relaxed, yet still highly relieved Irishman.

[NoflopsHomer]

Dean Sanders is OUT in 18th, only just got a bit of the action coming back to report the previous exit, but he apparently got it all in with 7-8 on a T-9-6 board against Marc Karam's T-9, turn and river came running sixes to send the gutted gutshot player home. Ouch, that's going to hurt.

[snoopy1239]

Jan Veit -- 230k
Kristof De Smedt -- 480k
Andy Black -- 800-900k
Alex Kim -- 855k
Ram Vaswani -- 350k
Philip Hilm -- 220k

[snoopy1239]

Kristof De Smedt is OUT in 17th place.

Shortstacked with around 100k in the small blind, Kristof found himself in uncomfortable surroundings when both Ram Vaswani and Andy Black saw an  Flop.

Andy bet 100k, Ram made it 300k and Andy folded, allowing Ram to pick up a smallish side pot.

Ram =

Kristof =

Turn =

River =

Down to 16 and a resulting redraw.

[Djinn]

Suddenly there's an all-in every couple of minutes - just prior to the 17th place elimination of Kristof de Smedt, Ram Vaswani got it all in on a 9-2-8 flop against him.  Ram held for the set, while Kristof had 9-7.

Fresh from the Dean Knockout, we held our breath on the turn, but the river housed him up and gave Ram a decent stack back (700k?).