Max Lykov doubled up just before the break, all-in on a flop with and finding a player simply called "Goncalves" in the player list making the call. Goncalves made the call with but couldn't catch a king on the turn or river and dropped to 16,000. Lykov now up to 150,000.
This has gone unbelievably quickly - we're down to just 82 players from the 221 we started with today. The average stack is around 140,000 - that'll be around 47 big blinds apiece when we return and start the next level - and it seems likely that play will have to slow down eventually, although apparently not yet.
A dangle over the busto abyss just now for American Tim Finne. He picked a spot to move in on the small blind (for c.60k) over a button raise, but it was big blind Morton Czuczor who asked the dealer to make his stack apparent, and then moved in over the top...
The button wanted no part of this and Czuczor showed all in vs. . The first card visible had Finne up and out of his chair - the - but there followed making a flush for both players on the board. Wide eyed with the closeness he smiled and sat back down as the dealer gave them half the pot each.
We caught up with Robert Willis checking the turn of a board. Nicolas Chouity put in a chunky bet which Willis called. We didn't quite catch the size of the bet, but by the time they got to the river there was at least 50,000 in the pot.
The river was the and Willis checked. Chouity now bet 24,500 and Willis tanked up for only a very short amount of time before making the call. Chouity showed his cards first - a lacklustre . Willis clapped with delight and turned over his which were good enough to take the pot as Chouity made a little "pfft" noise.
"Nice call," a railer told Willis.
"When you get in the zone, you know," said Willis, who is now up to 190,000. The EPT Grand Final champion dropped back to 110,000.
Breaking News
Just a few minutes later, and Chouity was gone. We don't know exactly what happened but online qualifier Patrick Carron was stacking chips as Chouity left the table.
Somehow some of the Italians have adopted Canadian PokerStars Team Pro Daniel Negreanu as out-of-tournament rail mascot - he greeted them in Italian as he made a flying visit to the tournament area ('them' being Fabrizio Ascari and Antonio Tarantino, who are sharing a table). Any excuse for some chat in their department, and there was expansive gesturing and friendly shouting galore.
"Daniel Ne-GREA-nuuu!" enthused Ascari. "You're number one!"
Looking at his stack, Negreanu countered, "No you're number one!"
"I'm number one!" he agreed. "But you're number one in the LIFE!"
"Ciao Daniel!" added Tarantino as he exited stage left.
With the board reading , Allan Baekke led out for 16,300 only for his fellow EPT champion to raise it to a chunky 53,500 with only 30,000 behind.
Baekke was immediately concerned, "Count please," said the Dane as he quickly recounted his own stack before checking, rechecking and re-rerechecking his cards. Chouity's aggressive reputation worked for him though as Baekke made the call and Chouity turned over for the backdoored nut-flush putting his own stack over the 150,000 mark as Baekke once more dropped to a short stack.
"It was nuts or nothing," sighed Baekke, "I thought if he had turned the flush draw he would've bet it."
Sometimes you build a 25k+ preflop pot, with lots of interested players with big stacks and a history of aggression, and then nothing of note happens. It's impossible to predict, poker, and sometimes you're poised, ready to note the fireworks when what you actually get is one of those kid-safe backyard Traffic Lights on red.
Just now Toby Lewis raised under the gun to 5,300, getting calls from Marton Czuczor, another in-position player and both blinds (old foe JP Kelly being in the big). The flop came down . It checked to Czuczor who bet 16,300. Swift passing from everyone apart from Toby Lewis who gave him a deathstare and really thought about this for a while. In the end, though, he too passed and that one ended there. Toby Lewis on 310000, Czuczor on 145k.