Updates from day three, level 16 of EPT Deauville, brought to you by Stephen Bartley, Howard Swains and Simon Young.
Latest chip counts are on the chip count page. The full payout structure can be found on the prizewinners and payout structure page. The EPT tournament structure can be found on the EPT tournament structure page.
Blinds:
Level 16: 2,500-5,000 (500 ante)
1.30pm: Level over
Quick as a (75-minute) flash, the level is done. Players now take a 15-minute break and we’ll return after that. With 113 players left at the moment, it’s fair to assume the bubble (at 104 players) will at least start, if not burst, in the coming level. Woo-hoo!
1.30pm: Quads will do nicely
We caught up with this nice coup as the chips were being shipped over to Andras Stumpf. In front of him was 3♣ 3♥ , and a glance at the board revealed K♦ 3♦ 3♠8♥ 5♦ . Quads tend to win on these occasions, and it was Etienne Carpentier who was seeing him chips slide across the table. Stumpf doubled up to 175,000.
1.25pm: Action junction
Jake Cody silently piled his way to near the top of the leaderboard yesterday, stacking more than 400,000 chips. Today he’s on the same table as Luca Pagano, and just lost a small pot to the Italian.
It was folded to Pagano on the button and he raised to 12,000. Cody called in the big blind. The flop came 9♣ 6♣ 6♠and they both checked. The 4♣ turned and Cody bet 17,000. Pagano made it 45,000 and Cody quickly got out the way.
It’s possible to position oneself in the tournament room at a junction between this Cody/Pagano table and that of Deeb/Lacay/Bosen/Nowakowski. Dario Minieri’s table is also within sight and earshot. It’s always interesting to listen to Minieri, who has developed a neat line in table patter over the years.
“What hand do you have?” he asked David Cohen.
“A good one,” said Cohen.
“How good is good?” continued Minieri.
“Aces,” said Cohen.
“You think I believe that?” said Minieri. “No one ever has aces. Aces never come.”
It’s worth adding that Minieri wasn’t even in a hand at this point. And neither was Cohen. And also it might be worth noting that Cohen is now out.
1.20pm: More aggro from Guenni
Another excitable player is Jacques Guenni who shouts proudly to the room “I am all in!” everytime he is, er, all in. On this occasion his 40,000 chips are over the line and he’s busy shouting at Richard Leblanc who had put in an earlier raise. As the cameras swooped, Guenni acted up even more. “If you think you have the worst hand you must call,” he told Leblanc, adding: “And if you think you have you have the best hand you must fold.”
Leblanc did not take his advice, and folded 8♥ 8♣ face up. Leblanc turned over J♠J♦ with more triumphant shouting, even though he had not secured the double up he needed.
1.15pm: Warning
Maxat Aibayev is one of two players here from Kazakhstan, and the first hour has gone pretty well for him: he’s up to about 530,000 from his overnight 337,000 – a lot of them from Tristan Clemencon, described below.
Aibayev himself just lost a small pot, doubling up the leerily vocal Anas Tadini, who has been the most visible presence today on account of his bellowing table manner.
Aibayev raised to 20,000, Tadini re-raised all in, and Aibayev called, showing Q♥ Q♣ . Tadini slapped his pocket aces on the table, then shouted full in the face of Aibayev when the board brought another ace, doubling him up.
It’s sportsmanship, French style, and the tournament director Thomas Kremser has now been moved to issue a warning for players to “keep their emotions under control”. Kremser mentioned “shouting” and “jumping” in particular, and cautioned that there might be an official penalty for anyone guilty of this behaviour.
He didn’t mention Tadini by name – but he might have well. Tadini is entertaining the rail, but he’s not winning many friends among other players, staff or media. Let’s see how much longer he lasts.
1.05pm: Getting close
Double ups galore with 117 players remaining. Remember, just 104 get paid.
Michael Benhammouda just doubled through Benjamin Juhasz, his A♣ 10♦ sturdy enough to withstand Juhasz’s 5♥ 6♥ straight draws on a board of 2♣ 3♣ Kâ™ 10♥ 8♦ . Manel Montalban did the same with king-queen.
Andrew Teng re-raised Richard Leblanc’s opening bet with a raise to 172,000. Leblanc said something along the lines of it must be nice to be able to bet so big, then tanked for a while. There was a lot of French being spoken, with Jacques Guenni, not in the hand, getting involved. Teng just sat waiting quietly. Eventually Leblanc folded.
1pm: Timex winds up
Mike McDonald opens on the button for 11,500 and faces a re-raise from Stephane Albertini, 26,000 total. McDonald thinks for only a second or two before announcing he was all in. Albertini’s tournament was on the line, and he decided not to risk it. A few more, then, to McDonald.
12.57pm: ElkY being ElkY
Andras Stumpf, a PokerStars qualifier from Hungary, makes it 10,000 from under the gun. It’s folded around to ElkY in the big blind who calls. Both check the J♦ 6♣ 5♦ flop, and also the 8♣ turn. But on the 5♥ river ElkY has seen enough, and bets 12,000 to take the pot.
Very next hand Sebastien Boyard is the under the gun, and he bets 13,000. It’s folded around to ElkY in the small blind, and he asks to see Boyard’s stack. It’s about half of his, and ElkY puts out a huge stack of blue, 10,000 chips. It’s 200,000 in all, covering Boyard. Boyard mucks quickly, and is shown 10â™ 10♣ for his trouble.
12.55pm: Deeb triples
The table with the newly chipped-up Peter Bosen, the aggressive Frenchman Ludovic Lacay, the aggressive Austrian Henry Nowakowski and the short-stacked Freddy Deeb is on fire.
“I’m looking forward to playing some pots with you,” said Lacay to Bosen and they continued to debate his surge from 50,000 to 400,000 within the first 15 minutes.
Deeb has been quietly observing all this — and then seized his opportunity to strike and to more than triple up to about 130,000.
Lacay raised to 13,000 from the hijack. It was the second time he had done this, but had been check-raised out of it the first time when Bosen defended his big blind and then raised Lacay’s bet on an eight-high flop.
This second time, Bosen merely opted to call from the small blind, which encouraged Deeb in from the big blind too. The flop came 9♣ 4♣ 7♦ and Bosen checked. Deeb moved all in. “How much do you have, Freddy?” asked Lacay and Deeb said that he had something like 60,000. The dealer thought differently, valuing each tower of pink 500 chips at 10,000 apiece and giving him a total of 33,500.
Lacay called. And so did Bosen. The turn was 6♣ and the two active players both checked. They also checked the Q♣ river.
Bosen tabled K♦ K♠for the slow-played big pocket pair, but it had backfired in a big way. Although Lacay mucked angrily, exposing a Q♦ , Deeb tabled 8♣ 5♣ for the flush and tripled up.
Bosen might have got some more from Lacay had he raised that monster pre-flop, almost certainly getting Deeb out of it. As it is, the American stayed in – and will be around some longer too. He has about 130,000 now.
12.42pm: Clemencon out
I suppose you could consider this a bad beat, handled well by Tristan Clemencon who just saw his tournament hopes evaporate thanks to the kind of luck that should provoke Maxat Aibayev to buy every lottery ticket he can get his hands on.
Clemencon was all-in with pocket aces against Aibayev’s queen-jack. The flop was harmless enough, a king with two nines, but the queen on the turn was just the first of two to come. The one on the river sent numerous over emotional players into guffaws of amazement. Not Clemencon, who despite being visibly shocked remained poised, shaking hands with Aibayev on his way to the door.
12.39pm: Deeb doubles
Freddy Deeb, short-stacked at the start of the day, just secured the necessary double up.
He opened with a shove for 31,000 under the gun, and it’s folded around to Peter Bosen in the big blind. He calls.
Deeb: A♥ Q♣
Bosen: K♣ Jâ™
Deeb was in good shape, and the board was an emphatic one for him, coming 7♠8♣ 8♥ Q♠Q♦ . Just a full house, then.
12.34pm: Ainsworth gets busy
After a suffering a late mini collapse last night, which meant he bagged up 109,000 rather than the 260,000 he had a little earlier, Team PokerStars Pro Jude Ainsworth is getting busy today.
On a 2♦ K♣ J♣ flop he bets 20,000 and that’s enough to push his sole opponent out of the pot. Ainsowrth creeps up to 134,000.
12.30pm: Bosen bounces back
Peter Bosen first came to our attention last night when he lost a big hand to Stefan Fuchs’ cutely played flopped set of aces. That hefty loss was partly responsible for his starting stack of only 48,000 today, but within no more than about 15 minutes he’s up to a mighty 380,000.
He doubled up first with ace-king versus Freddy Deeb’s king-queen. Then he doubled up again with kings versus Ludovic Lacay’s ace-queen. And then he flopped quads with pocket sevens and got paid off again. Bosen is well back in the hunt.
12.25pm: Kitai in control
From the off Bruno Fitoussi, who at times had to eek his way through day two, came out firing, 12,500 from under the gun. Davidi Kitai was in the small blind and re-raised to 38,000 total, putting an immediate dampener on Fitoussi’s plans. Kitai brought the next hand to an early close as well, re-raising Ian MacDonald’s pre-flop bet to end another hand.
12.20pm: More time for Timex
The official chip count that came round overnight had a few minor errors in it. And although all that was missing from Mike McDonald’s count was a zero, it’s the difference between being in last place (with 25,800) and well chipped up (with 258,000). The latter is true and the error has been fixed.
12.15pm: Enjoy this one
The tastiest table this afternoon is probably the one featuring, in a row, Robert Cezarescu (day one chip leader), Shane “shaniac” Schleger and the Team PokerStars Pro Jude Ainsworth. Two seats down is Patrick Bruel.
All of them are chipped up, although Schleger just suffered a small setback. He raised to 12,000 then was priced in to call a short-stack’s all in push – about 42,000 more. Schleger had 4♣ 4♥ against the short stack’s 10♦ 10â™ and there was no outdraw.
12pm: Unbagging
Some players have arrived and some haven’t. Some are unbagging chips, some aren’t. While all this indecision takes place, read today’s introduction. Someone has to.
11.40am: Good morning?
It’s day three of EPT Deauville, we think. We think? Well, Team PokerStars Blog is still suffering severe jet lag and nervous exhaustion from the PCA, and coming straight to Deauville afterwards has played havoc with our brains (which are a little muddled at the best of times). Anyway, you’ll not notice anything amiss once play gets under way today; your coverage will be as brilliant as ever. With added Gallic flair.
It’s all scheduled to start at noon. Maybe.
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