Arnaud Mattern raised to 1,050 in middle position; Gus Hansen made the call. On the flop, Hansen check-called 1,700, before check-raising Mattern's bet of 4,800 on the turn to 25,000, thus putting the Frenchman all in. Mattern called with for the flush, whilst Hansen was drawing dead with a paltry .
Ilari Sahamies went from 40k to nearly out just now as a couple of hands shrunk his stack to the all-in-preflop sort of size. The most dramatic was against Dennis Phillips, who called two streets with , 2,200 on a flop, and 6,800 on a turn. Both players checked the river and Phillips' Jacks were good - Sahamies held for a worse-kickered pair which had picked up a flush draw on the turn which failed to materialise.
Moments later and Sahamies had the rest of his stack in preflop with Tens against David Williams' Kings - but a turned Ten saved his bacon and gave him another shot at chip accumulating in this last level of the day.
Colourful Dutchman Noah Boeken has just taken the chip lead after "winning a big pot with a set of jacks", according to my man on the inside. As a result, Boeken leads the pack with 115,000.
Theo Jorgensen, he of the immovable face and traditional deep tournament run, just upped his stack to 73,000 courtesy of a flopped set of Deuces. He bet out 5k from the big blind (where he'd called a raise) on a flop, and got a fairly brisk call. No bet from either player on the turn, but Jorgensen bet out a hefty 12,500 on the river which eventually got a call-muck combination when he turned over his
Peter Eastgate's chair has someone else on it, as does Robert Williamson III's so I am inclined to credit them with having left the tournament.
Hovering in the dangerous stack zone (under 14k) are Julian Thew (although that's nothing new - he was on 4k two levels ago and shows no sign of stopping grinding his tiny stack back up) and Nik Persaud, Sorel Mizzi and Barry Greenstein.
Down to just 5,000, Sorel Mizzi pushed all in from the button with , but was looked up by Julian Thew's in the big blind. Thew's ace high held up leaving him with 15,000, whilst Mizzi was left with a walk to the rail.
Ben Roberts raised to 1,500 preflop and received one caller on the button. On the flop, Roberts' continuation bet of 2,500 was flat calling, leading to a change of tactics on the turn where Roberts opted to check. His opponent bet 3,330, which Roberts called, but the wily Brit ultimately gave up on the river in the face of a bet.
A strange hand just lost Gus Hansen 5k+ out of his 16k stack. It was kind of a dwell-off between him and his in-position opponent, of whose identity I am not 100% sure but from 10 feet and via one contact lense he looks a bit like Carter Phillips, perhaps.
Anyhow, the point was mainly that Hansen, having bet 2,200 on a flop and been called, checked the turn and found a bet of 3,200 back at him. Now started a whirl of own-stack reorganisation, spreading, stacking by colour, stacking in two or three piles, removing the big denom chips and putting them back - this went on for several minutes. It was sort of hypnotic; all eyes on the table were on his hands as he fiddled with his short stack like someone doing the Three Card Monty.
Finally he called. On the river he checked again, and now it was his opponent's turn to join the dexterity ballet, threading and rethreading his green chips for a couple of minutes back at him. Then he bet 5k and Hansen instapassed. Odd.