2010 PokerStars EPT Vilamoura

Day 1a completed

Posted 08-29-2010 00:41 GMT+1 by Homer

Day 1A Chip Counts (full)

Posted 08-29-2010 00:37 GMT+1 by Homer

Chip Counts
1	Andre Coimbra	PokerStars Team Online	157,600	0
2	Paul Foltyn	PokerStars Online Qualifier	145,900	0
3	Toby Lewis		141,900	99,900
4	Dario Minieri	PokerStars Team Pro (Italy)	131,400	0
5	Antonio Esfandiari		127,800	0
6	Arnaud Mattern	PokerStars Team Pro (France)	119,200	-300
7	Antony Lellouche		114,100	48,100
8	Nicolas Chouity		108,800	0
9	Mark Ioli		108,200
10	Frank Calo		103,100
11	Michel Abecassis		100,100	100
12	David Klar		94,800
13	Jose Maria De Noronha		93,500
14	Wolfgang Wurzer		93,300
15	Grzegorz Cichocki		91,400
16	Olivier Mallet		90,900
17	Dan Heimiller		83,800	3,800
18	Rico Schulz		83,700
19	Bruno Pedro Fonseca Pocas		80,900
20	Pieter de Korver	PokerStars Team Pro (Netherlands)	80,800	11,800
21	Fabrizio Ascari		80,200	10,200
22	Alexey Golodyaev		79,900
23	Konsta Vesterinen		77,800
24	Andras Nemeth		73,700
25	Gyula Szilagyi		73,000

Read full

End of Day 1a

Posted 08-28-2010 21:33 GMT+1 by Homer

Andre Coimbra - Chip Leader

The chips are being bagged and tagged but it looks as though PokerStars Team Online player Andre Coimbra has snuck into the chip lead at the end of the day. The Portuguese player sits at the top of the table with 157,600 but he is surrounded by many familiar faces as Team Pros Dario Minieri and Arnaud Mattern are also in the leading group.

Minieri's reputation worked well for him today, getting a full-on double up when his aces won out against king-queen on a queen high flop and although he lost with kings to aces late on, he'll remain a credible threat when Monday's Day 2 begins. Mattern had a much rougher ride, dropping to 18,000 early on before successive double ups in barely 10 minutes put him amongst the leaders.

Antonio Esfandiari, making a rare appearance at an EPT had a very solid day finishing just shy of 130,000 while former GUKPT grand final winner Paul 'badpab2' Foltyn built himself an excellent 145,000 stack with which to finish the day on.

Nevertheless, all our remaining players will be returning on monday, joined by the survivors of tomorrow's Day 1b. We'll back tomorrow from 12pm local time (GMT+1), see you then!

Dempsey Levels Himself. And His Stack.

Posted 08-28-2010 21:19 GMT+1 by Homer

James Dempsey raised to 1,600 from the cutoff and Toby Lewis peeled from the small blind.

The flop came and Lewis checked, Dempsey bet 2,700 and Lewis check-raised to 7,000 before Dempsey now clicked it back to 11,300. Lewis now raised once more to 16,000 and then Dempsey made it 24,000.

Lewis pushed all-in for 67,700 and Dempsey called with in a world of trouble behind Lewis' . The on the turn gave Dempsey a chance of a split but the river sent the 140,000 chip pot across to Lewis.

Dempsey described the hand to his friends Paul Foltyn and Team Pokerstars Pro JP Kelly with a little bit of ridiculous glee over his own silliness but also stating that Lewis had tried to 5-bet bluff him earlier.

After hearing Dempsey's description of what happened, Kelly replied to his friend, "You are the worst player in the world."

Dempsey is left with about 16,000 or so.

Tags: James Dempsey, Toby Lewis.

Last 4 Hands

Posted 08-28-2010 20:59 GMT+1 by danafish

As we approach the time for the bagging and the tagging, the title of Overnight Chip Leader is being fought over between two of PokerStars' finest: Dario Minieri, and Andre Coimbra of Team Online. As we head into the last few hands of Day 1a, they're on just shy of 150,000 apiece and we'll have to wait until the end of play to find out which of these two players - or indeed someone else - ends up top of the chip count pops.

Tags: Dario Minieri, Andre Coimbra.

The Mattern-er Prize

Posted 08-28-2010 20:56 GMT+1 by Homer

A few months back, Arnaud Mattern was at a loss, his fellow Team PokerStars Pro Bertrand 'ElkY' Grospellier was seemingly invincible, doing well at everything whereas Mattern just wasn't getting the same breaks.

Mattern did some thorough research into hand histories and found one important difference of what ElkY was doing that he wasn't, ElkY was simply winning every crucial flip where Mattern was losing them.

Today though, Mattern is winning these big hands, having been moved tables, Mattern 3-bet Martin Wendt's 2,100 UTG open to 5,600. Wendt shipped his 20,000 stack into the middle and Mattern called with flipping vs Wendt's .

As the board came , Wendt sighed as he put his coat on, "That's how you win these things..."

Mattern has 121,000.

Tags: Arnaud Mattern, Martin Wendt.

Seeing Double

Posted 08-28-2010 20:40 GMT+1 by danafish

As we already mentioned, we have no fewer than two Lerners in the field, and we are having some difficulty telling them apart. We were hoping that the de Meulder twins would both be playing tomorrow, but for some reason Christophe de Meulder has decided not to play the main event and we are only getting Matthias.

Nevertheless we have discovered one more it's-going-to-be-fantastic-if- they-both-make-the-final-table familial pairing. We knew that Team PokerStars Pro Juan Maceiras was playing today, but it has only just come to our attention that his dad, Juan Maceiras Barro, is also in the field. He qualified online. You may know Mr. Maceiras Sr. better by his online name, "vietcong01" - he's won the Sunday Million twice. At another EPT not so long ago we heard Juan Jr.'s sister Maria Maceiras tell her table, "In my family even the dog plays poker." We're not sure whether she's going to be playing tomorrow as well - and if Maceiras Sr. increases his current 20,000 stack it could possibly end up being an all-Maceiras final...

Tags: Juan Maceiras, Juan Maceiras Barro.

Clash of the Titans (KK vs. AA) as Minieri Doubles de Novonha

Posted 08-28-2010 20:33 GMT+1 by Djinn

More action than a blended Die Hard box set now as under the gun raiser Jose Maria de Novonha found all the interest he could have wanted - first off Dario Minieri upped it to 7,000, then Joao de Silva fourbet to 17,800 (with over 40k behind). The shortest stack involved, de Novonha, immediately got it all over the line (around 26k). Back to Minieri, who checked out de Silva's stack, then moved in enough 5k chips to cover him as well!

De Silva thought for so long the clock was finally called on him, and immediately Minieri said, "I have Kings. You have Aces?" De Novonha nodded his agreement and it was vs. , with a third Ace being the only excitement brought by the board.

Smiling, Minieri paid off the correct amount to double him up and said, "That's poker! That's part of the game!" with a grin which seemed completely genuine, not like when players are really disguising their bad beat/cold deck sourness with the empty words of even-temperedness. Plus it didn't really hurt him as he's still one of the chip leaders. De Novonha up to 70k.

Tags: Dario Minieri, Joao de Silva, Jose Maria de Novonha.

Sing When You're Winning, Or When Your Friend Is Losing.

Posted 08-28-2010 20:29 GMT+1 by Homer

The Brits love their banter like no other, the only thing more fun than winning a big pot is watching one of your best friends lose an even bigger one. James Dempsey opened preflop from the button to 1,600 only for the big blind to reraise to 4,100.

Dempsey then 4-bet to 9,000 but the big blind moved all-in, Dempsey rechecked his cards and quickly folded. All of this delighted Toby Lewis who quickly made an "in your eye" gesture. It's all harmless good fun, but the bragging rights at the end of this day are worth so much more if you can knock out a friend...

Tags: James Dempsey, Toby Lewis.

I Heart the River

Posted 08-28-2010 20:11 GMT+1 by danafish

Vicky Coren

Over 10,000 in chips had amassed in the middle of the table by the time we arrived on the river of the board. Not a massive pot exactly, but not insignificant. Two players had checked around to Vicky Coren in position.

"Are there three hearts there?" she asked.

The dealer chuckled and confirmed: "Yes, there are three hearts there."

Coren nonchalantly bet 5,000. Alexandru Cezarescu just flat-called in the big blind, the third player folded, and they turned over their cards. Coren turned hers over first - for the nut flush. Cezarescu made a face and turned over for the second nut flush, while everyone at the table ooh-ed and ahh-ed at the flat call.

One Lerner twin, the one who was not seated at that table anyway, appeared out of nowhere. He told Coren, "We're expecting another tweet from you."

Another player at the table explained to Lerner that Coren had just won a decent pot with the ace-high flush against the king-high flush.

Lerner looked down at Coren's stack. "So where's the rest of the pot?" he asked cheerfully.

Whatever Lerner thinks about it, Coren's 34,000 stack represents a fine comeback from the 10,000 or so she was down to earlier in the day.

Tags: Vicky Coren.