The chips went in the middle preflop. Roland De Wolfe was holding against Ian Frazer's .
The board ran out .
De Wolfe's win in Match 3 gave him the last remaining seat in the Final Table. He'll be joining Phil Laak, David Benyamine, Giovanni Safina, Luke Schwartz, and Daniel Negreanu.
The final table of the Party Poker Premier League IV is underway. You may be wondering what advantage players who earned more points in the prelim heats have. Well, for each point a player earned during the preliminary matches, they get 10,000 in chips. So, the chip counts to start the final table are as follows.
1. Phil Laak – 480,000
2. David Benyamine - 380,000
3. Giovanni Safina - 290,000
4. Luke Schwartz – 290,000
5. Daniel Negreanu – 260,000
6. Roland De Wolfe – 220,000
Play has been pretty close to the vest during the first few minutes of play. There have been no real huge hands against other huge hands, no big bluffs, and not one showdown yet. The players are feeling each other out trying to get a feel for their opponents.
Giovanni Safina made it 6,000 to go and found a caller in Daniel Negreanu. Since we're in the production truck, we can tell you that Safina had and Negreanu had .
The two checked the flop.
When the came on the turn, Negreanu fired a 8,000 bet into the pot and Safina folded.
Chip Counts Now:
David Benyamine - 354,000
Roland De Wolfe – 231,000
Giovanni Safina - 291,000
Luke Schwartz – 277,000
Daniel Negreanu – 249,000
Phil Laak – 472,000
Daniel Negreanu raised to 4,000 preflop with pocket aces, and David Benyamine three-bet to 13,000 with . Negreanu decided to just call, and the players saw a flop, putting Benyamine in a precarious position.
Benyamine led out for 13,000, and once again Negreanu played things slowly by just calling.
The turn was the , and once again Benyamine took the lead thinking he must have the best hand and bet 38,000. Phil Hellmuth in the booth commented that the smart thing for Negreanu to, to extract maximum value would be to smooth call again, which is exactly what Negreanu did.
The river brought the , which put Benyamine into deep thought. He slowly counted out chips, stacking them in various positions before finally checking to Negreanu. After sizing up the pot, Negreanu decided on a bet size, 85,000 to be exact. After a minute or so of pondering, Benyamine tossed out the chips to make the call and saw the bad news.
Benyamine is down to 230,000 while Negreanu who battled earlier today to make this final table is now second in chips with 413,000.
We didn't catch the preflop action, but both David Benyamine and Daniel Negreanu saw a flop. Benyamine holding led out on the flop, and Negreanu holding made the call.
The turn was the , and Benyamine's hand got a lot stronger and he led out on the turn again for 26,000. Negreanu, not wanting to believe him made the call with ace-high.
The river was the giving Benyamine a full house, but making Nergeani's hand feel a bit stronger to him with the board double-paired. Benyamine bet 46,000 and Negreanu went into the tank.
He said, "I can't think of a hand I can beat here," but continued "I'm just not sure I can give you credit for hand either." Benyamine jovially started chatting about the hands they both could have, and Negreanu continued his banter saying "the more you talk, the more I want to fold."
Negreanu, couldn't find the fold button though and made the crying call. When Benyamine rolled his hand over Luke Schwartz quickly said "obviously!" as Benyamine collected the pot.