For the second hand in a row, Allan Bække opened to 135,000. This time, Erik Tamm three-bet to 335,000 on the button, but the action wasn't done yet. In the big blind, Alexey Rybin took pause for just a minute before moving all in with a huge reraise to 3.17 million. Bække let out a wisecrack and a smirk before folding, but Tamm shook his head and made the call as the only covering player at the table. With a pot of nealy 7 million chips up for grabs and Rybin at risk of elimination, the cards were on their backs:
Tamm:
Rybin:
Tamm was about a two-to-one favorite, but he was clearly more nervous than Rybin as he paced around back and forth behind his chair. After a pause to build the suspense, the dealer ran out a flop full of blanks, . The turn didn't change much, leaving Rybin dead to one of the three remaining aces.
River: (Bink!)
It took several shoves of the dealers arms to get all 6.545 million chips into Rybin's corner, and he has now taken over the chip lead in the room with that amount. We're still waiting to get an eye on Tamm's remaining stacks, but he can't have very much at all.
Erik Tamm moved all-in UTG for 575,000 and it's passed to Claudio Piceci in the big blind who looked at his cards and sighed like he had a decision. He thought for a minute then decided to folded face up.
Claudio Rinaldi opened for 140,000 under the gun only for Dermot Blain to his immediate left to make it 375,000 to go. Michael Piper in the big blind was interested enough to ask Blain how much he had behind - answer: 1,750,000 - but folded. Back to Rinaldi.
Rinaldi dwelled up and stared at Blain's cards as though he might suddenly acquire the power of x-ray vision if he just wanted it badly enough. Then he announced all in. Blain called without asking how much it was.
Rinaldi:
Blain:
Board:
Rinaldi's all in had been for over 1.1 million and he doubled to 2.4 million. Blain meanwhile was left with just a shade over 1 million.
Toni Pettersson raised and Per Linde, newly moved to the outer table and now occupying Dermot Blain's former seat, quietly announced all in. "All in?" said Pettersson excitedly like he couldn't wait to get his chips in. He called.
Pettersson:
Linde:
Board:
Pettersson cracked what we believe to be his first smile of the day when he flopped the higher flush draw, but the lack of a third club on the turn meant that they were chopping the pot.
The very next hand and Per Linde shoved again for 1.6 million to a raise from Liv Boeree. Boeree decided not to risk it, though, and swiftly passed when she'd heard how much it was for.