Poker News Round-up

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Poker News Round-up: Week #04

By Adam Noone, 25/01/2008

Plenty of live tournament news to bring you this week starting with the conclusion of the Aussie Millions festival in Melbourne. The main event brought 780 entrants together over the course of three separate day ones as many of the game’s most recognisable players sought to win the A$1,650,000 (about £725,000) first prize. Andy Black and Phil Ivey led the way after the first day but a notable performance from Rob Akery saw him take one of the better stacks into day two. Back in November when Joe Beevers won the GBPT grand final in Bristol, Akery took second place and part of his prize was a package to this tournament. Akery kept his head as many famous players busted out around him and by the time the bubble burst on day three he was still around to ensure he recorded another cash. The rarely sighted Tiffany Williamson also made the money but whilst she exited in 36th place, Akery’s stack kept on growing and he finished the day in fifth place.

When Akery finally busted in ninth, his chips added to the massive stack that had been accumulated by Australian Michael Chrisanthopoulos, who looked like a clear favourite when he held 40% of the chips with seven players left. However, on the final day’s play Alexander Kostritsyn picked up the pace, eliminating the first three players and taking over the chip lead. When Kostritsyn’s pocket tens knocked Chrisanthopoulos out in third, there was only one more player between him and the title. Unfortunately for him that other player was one of the very best in the world in the form of eight time WSOP bracelet winner Erik Seidel. Seidel had steadily chipped away at the final table, rarely risking his tournament life to be where he was so it was perhaps a little surprising that he called a check raise for all his chips on the flop with no pair and no straight or flush draws. Kostritsyn’s top pair held up and the Russian became the second ever Aussie Millions champion.

With many top players down under, the attendance for the WPT World Poker Open in Tunica was the lowest it had been for several years. There were some who jumped straight on a plane after busting out of the Aussie Millions to take part here but that appeared not be a great decision for the likes of Andy Black and Phil Ivey who quickly found themselves out of another tournament within a few orbits of being sat down.

Men Nguyen

Men Nguyen is a player who many people have some strong opinions about and on day three when play was down to three tables he didn’t do himself any favours in the popularity stakes. Firstly, after winning a monster pot when his top set held up against Erik Lindgren’s flush draw, Nguyen leapt up screaming “yes” repeatedly prompting comments from several unimpressed members of his table. But that was nothing compared to what he decided to do when play was down to seven, with just one more elimination needed for the televised final. His only opponent in the pot Brett Faustman had just moved all in on the river and although he held the nut straight, Nguyen for some reason spent a couple of minutes counting out his chips and thinking out loud what Faustman might have. After some apparent agonising he finally made the call and Faustman showed the same nut straight. Even then Nguyen just sat there letting Faustman and his supporters think that he must have won the pot until he eventually turned over his cards and revealed the slow roll for a split pot.

After that incident it looked at one point as though the script was set for Faustman and Nguyen to settle things with a heads up battle for the title but with three left Nguyen lost all his chips to Hoyt Corkins. Former dealer Faustman and “Cowboy” Corkins took roughly equal stacks up against one another and after a little exchanging of chips finally got it all in when they both held pocket pairs. Faustman had both the bigger stack and better pair, and his queens held up to give a $892,413 victory to the young American.

Julian Thew

Back in England, Julian Thew’s hot streak continues into 2008 as he hit another big win in Brighton. Last September Thew won the Plymouth leg of the GUKPT, then a month later won the Baden EPT for nearly a million dollars and followed that up with a second in the London GUKPT. With money by now coming out of his ears, Thew also defeated a field of 280 runners in Brighton to win another £90,000 and become the first player to pick up two GUKPT titles. At least the money is going to someone who seems to be well liked and respected by his peers.

The distinction between live and online play has become less pronounced in recent times and that is possibly set to continue further if World Series Of Poker Peer To Peer Texas Hold’Em machines are a success. Harrah’s and Gaming Laboratories International plan to introduce terminals into a variety of venues such as casinos, bars and clubs allowing places without an existing card room the facility to host poker games. Players can link up with others in the same venue or play against opponents from anywhere else on the same network. Having to travel out to play poker on a screen and not be able to interact with the others at your table seemingly combines the worst of both worlds but presumably someone somewhere has done market research and feels that these machines will get played.

Finally, an update on the situation Ultimatebet finds itself in at the moment is that there is actually very little news. Having promised to investigate what many players feel is foul play by means of a superuser account, another week has passed with Ultimatebet making no official comment on the situation. There is a rumour that the site will pass all hand histories to an independent third party for examination but presumably by now they will have had plenty of opportunity to analyse this information themselves. Some sort of comment to update concerned customers might have been expected by this time and whatever the explanation for this unusual activity on the site, a wall of silence is only fuelling people’s suspicions. One area where they have been more active though is in contacting many previously high volume players to ask them why they have not been on the site recently – an unenviable task for whoever was given that job.

Next week by there will hopefully be more to report on this situation, and there will definitely be a new WPT champion already. There are more stops than ever on the tour this year and next up is the Borgata Winter Open in Atlantic City.

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