OK, the title is a little misleading but Melanie Weisner and Liviu Ignat have just been in a hand that took almost 10 minutes to complete, despite the fact it never got past the turn!
Weisner opened on the button with a raise to 5,600 and Ignat considered his options for at least 90 seconds before making a raise to 14,600. Another minute and a half thinking time and Weisner called.
Flop: - Ignat sat riffling his chips for a minute or so before betting 13,600, sending Weisner into the tank. She was staring at her opponent intensely, hoping to get some sort of read, eventually making the call.
Turn: - Again, the methodical Ignat sat for more than two minutes, with Weisner still staring at him through her hair, before betting exactly 30,000 chips. At this point the Pink Panther music sounded indicating it was the end of level 13. Most of the table left for a break, meaning they missed the pretty black and purple pattern created by Weisner's chip riffling. They also missed the four minutes of sitting there waiting for her to act. Eventually she did act, she folded.
"Come on! Show me one time!" pleaded Weisner.
"You can choose one," offered Ignat, at which point Weisner flipped a single card over to reveal the
"Nice hand," she said before asking literally dozens of questions regarding Ignat's hand strength. If only she played as fast as she talked!
In the one hand that took place between the two where Antoine Saout shoved, Kevin MacPhee took a nasty hit.
He opened to 5,500 and got a call from Andreas Berggren on the button. We must confess that we missed the action on the flop as something that looked interesting was going on on the next table, but when we returned on the , some more chips had made their way into the middle and MacPhee was betting out 19,500. Berggren called.
The river was the and this time MacPhee checked. Berggren bet 27,000 and MacPhee instantly announced, "Call."
"You have ace-king?" asked Berggren, but MacPhee flipped pocket , which had been outdrawn by Berggren's . MacPhee shook his head and dropped to 120,000; Berggren raked in the large pot and moved up to 290,000.
We're not sure exactly what happened, but as we strolled by their table we noticed that Antoine Saout and Luca Pagano, previously on roughly equal stacks, had veered off in totally opposite directions - Pagano was up to 175,000, while Saout was down to just 5,400.
5,400 comprises fewer than three big blinds right now, and sure enough he pushed within seconds of our arrival. He got one call, but both he and his opponent held raggy aces and they chopped it up.
A couple hands later Kevin MacPhee opened to 5,500 and Saout pushed again, this time for 8,000. Hugo Lemaire called on the button, as did MacPhee, and they checked down the board. Saout turned over pocket and neither player could beat it - they both mucked, while Saout is back in with a shot on 28,000 or so.
We're not sure of the details but the fact Praz Bansi is sitting on the sidelines suggests he has busted from the Main Event.
The double WSOP bracelet winner, who has $2,408,946 in live tournament winnings, is amazingly yet to cash in a single European Poker Tour event. He thought he had managed to break his duck at the 2010 PokerStars Caribbean Adventure but this stop is now part of the NAPT.
Painful exit for Yury Guly just now, at the hands of Saša Stančič, who had a painful decision of his own after his newfound friend sent him into the tank on the big blind. Stančič had three-bet under the gun raiser Guly (17,400) only to find him making yet another raise - this time to 50,000 (with around 80k behind). Stančič asked him, "You sure you want to ruin our friendship?" before standing up in agitation.
"Can we talk?" he asked Guly, who gave him an amiable mini-conversation in Russian before the dealer reminded them that during hands, English only is to be spoken at the table.
"That's all I know in Russian," Stančič deadpanned instantly, before sitting down with his chair backwards, and admitting, "I don't know how to get out of this."
He moved in and was instantly called - Guly showed and Stančič .
Flop:
Turn:
...River: !
He may not have known how to get out of it, but the deck came through with a river two-outer to bust Guly and propel Stančič up over 200,000.
Yury Kerzhapkin just put Toby Lewis to the test but the young Brit did not take the bait and simply folded his hand.
Yonatan Basin raised to 5,200 from late position and when the hijack folded, Toby Lewis made the call. No soon had he done so, Kerzhapkin moved all in from the big blind! Basin folded but Lewis seemed a little more interested in his hand and asked his opponent for a count.
"51,600" came the reply from the dealer, not actually from Kerzhapkin himself. Ninety seconds later and Lewis' hand hit the muck.
Mikhail Lakhitov is up to the heady heights of 320,000 after knocking out another player - this time with against Ronan Collet's pocket jacks, a king dropping on the river.
We've not had an official Table of Doom so far in this tournament but Table 4 must come very close to being just that.
Currently seated there are Team PokerStars Pros Liv Boeree and Marcin Horecki, Franciso Torres, Mikael Norinder, David Sonelin, Kevin Stani and Fabrice Soulier. Pretty Doomy if you ask me, in fact I will go out on a limb and officially announce Table 4 as "The Table of Doom!"
- Ignat sat riffling his chips for a minute or so before betting 13,600, sending Weisner into the tank. She was staring at her opponent intensely, hoping to get some sort of read, eventually making the call.
- Again, the methodical Ignat sat for more than two minutes, with Weisner still staring at him through her hair, before betting exactly 30,000 chips. At this point the Pink Panther music sounded indicating it was the end of level 13. Most of the table left for a break, meaning they missed the pretty black and purple pattern created by Weisner's chip riffling. They also missed the four minutes of sitting there waiting for her to act. Eventually she did act, she folded.
flop as something that looked interesting was going on on the next table, but when we returned on the 
, some more chips had made their way into the middle and MacPhee was betting out 19,500. Berggren called.
and this time MacPhee checked. Berggren bet 27,000 and MacPhee instantly announced, "Call."
. MacPhee shook his head and dropped to 120,000; Berggren raked in the large pot and moved up to 290,000.
board. Saout turned over pocket 
and neither player could beat it - they both mucked, while Saout is back in with a shot on 28,000 or so.
against Ronan Collet's pocket jacks, a king dropping on the river.