We've had a flurry of all ins over the past few minutes, but most of them have resulted in double ups for the short stacks.
The most recent all in came over on Table 4 when Artem Litvinov open-shoved his remaining 29,000 chips from early position. Volodymyr Pilyavskyy thought it over for several minutes before making the call as the rest of the table quickly folded out of the way.
Litvinov began crossing himself and mumbling towards the sky as he tabled . Pilyavskyy turned over , poised to send a double up over to his foe. The flop was a huge sweat though as it came to give the covering player a flush draw to work with. The on the turn gave him an additional three outs to the straight, but the that hit the river was a safe card for Litvinov.
He broke out into a fist-pumping frenzy as he crossed himself again and made a thankful gesture upwards. The massage therapist working on his shoulders asked, "Did you win?" He's notched himself a double up, sitting with just over 60,000 now and back in the game.
The Dutch have lost Raoul Refos from this event as he was unable to get moving in the right direction today. The hopes of Holland now lay with the relatively short-stacked Ad Schaap (62,000) and the online qualifier Menno Mulder (136,000). Should either of them manage to take this thing down, they will be the third consecutive Dutch player to win an EPT event, following Constant Rijkenberg (EPT San Remo) and Pieter de Korver (EPT Grand Final) from last season.
In a battle of the blinds, Francesco Cirianni and Vadim Markushevski got it all in before the flop with Cirianni being the player at risk, covered by just a few thousand chips. There was good news for him though as he tabled to his opponent's .
The news would soon turn worse, unfortunately, as the flop came out to vault Markushevski into a big lead. Looking for a ten or a king but finding none, Cirianni watched the last turn and river of his day come out and respectively. He's out.
After running hot on Day 2, Priit Turner of Estonia couldn't sustain things here on Day 3 and has been eliminated. The end came on a big hand versus Joram Voelklein. The pair ended up getting it all in following a flop. Turner held ace-king with the , and Voelklein had . The turn was the and the river the , and after a lengthy counting out of the chips it was determined Voelklein had Turner barely covered.
The Estonian hits the rail, while Voelklein moves up to 365,000.
We pick up the action in a heads-up pot with the flop showing . The preflop action is unclear but significant as more than 30,000 chips were already piled in the middle of the table. After a check from Alex Fitzgerald, Kirill Boydachenko slid out a bet of 25,500. The American began stacking out a tower of chips, and he eventually check-raised to 62,000, which Boydachenko quickly called.
The turn brought the and another check from Fitzgerald. Without wasting any time again, Boydachenko fired 77,000 at the pot, and Fitzgerald would take his time to consider. He cut down his own chip stack and began to eyeball it against the stack of his opponent, shooting sour looks across the felt. The clock was called on him relatively quickly, but he didn't seem to mind as he quietly said, "I fold," after about another 30 seconds.
After that exchange, Boydachenko has leapt up to 390,000, dropping Fitzgerald back to about 180,000.
Just before the High Roller event kicked off in the tournament room, Gloria Balding pulled aside Shaun Deeb for sixty seconds of interrogation in a little thing we like to call, "Calling the Clock". Check it out:
Videos are being posted all day, so check out PokerNews TV to catch all the latest interviews and updates.
We just caught the tail end of this pot, but here's what we could see. With a bit more than 25,000 in the pot and the board showing , Lucasz Plichta led out with a smallish bet of 10,000. After some deep consideration, his lone opponent Vitaly Tolokonnikov stacked out a raise to 45,000 and slid it forward. Plichta didn't take too long to mull it over before making the call.
"Straight," said Tolokonnikov, turning over ... which makes a straight flush. It's not clear whether or not he ever realized what he was showing down as Plichta mucked and he quietly raked in the pot without any reaction whatsoever. "Straight's good," said someone at the far end of the felt with a slight chuckle.
Kind of a curious hand just went down over on Table 5 between a couple of big stacks, Igor Dubinsky and Michele Limongi.
With about 65,000 in the middle and the board showing , Dubinsky bet 36,000, then Limongi raised to 100,000. Dubinsky thought a bit, then called.
The river brought yet another heart in the form of the . Dubinsky checked quickly, then Limongi looked up and said "I check" as well. Both continued to look at each other, then Limongi said "Who shows first?" The dealer indicated Limongi should, and he turned over for a pair of kings. Dubinsky slid his cards toward the muck, prompting some raising of the eyebrows and a few "oohs" around the table.
Limongi pushes into the chip lead more than 700,000, while Dubinsky is at about 310,000 now.