Soheb Porbandarwala Putting on a Clinic, Leads WPT World Championship Final Table
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Six players are still standing after Friday's Day 5 session in the $10,400 buy-in WPT World Championship at Wynn Las Vegas, all with a shot to win more than $2.5 million.
No player will return to action on Sunday with a bigger stack than Soheb Porbandarwala, who put on a dominant performance at the unoffficial nine-player final table. Day 5 saw some brilliant play from the 12 players who bagged chips on Thursday.
Porbandarwala cruised by the rest of the field throughout much of the Day 4 session, which ended with Jeremy Becker running hot late to overtake the chip lead. But it was back to pure dominance from Soheb on Day 5.
Dominant Performance
Porbandarwala, with 81,325,000 chips, is not only the chip leader. He doesn't even have a close competitor. Schuyler Thornton, who quietly chipped up with numerous small pots, is a distant second place with 36,500,000 chips.
That said, there isn't a true short stack at the final table. Every player will come back to Wynn with at least 26 big blinds, meaning the final table is likely going to be a grueling, marathon session.
Final Table Chip Counts
| Place | Player | Chip Stack |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Soheb Porbandarwala | 81,325,000 |
| 2 | Schuyler Thornton | 36,500,000 |
| 3 | Jeremy Brown | 21,675,000 |
| 4 | Jeremy Becker | 18,200,000 |
| 5 | Maxx Coleman | 15,250,000 |
| 6 | Chad LIption | 13,250,000 |
Becker, who battled with Porbandarwala in numerous pots on the livestream, briefly overtook the chip lead by a small amount. But he made a costly ace-high bluff that didn't get through against Jeremy Brown, which set "JBex" back a bit. He'd finish play with 18,200,000 chips.
Porbandarwala then returned to his familiar spot — the chip leader — for the remainder of the session, largely in part to outplaying his opponents. In one hand, he four-bet preflop with 9♦2♦, getting the short stack, Linglin Zeng to fold 7♠7♦. Zeng, who has competed on Hustler Casino Live numerous times, eventually busted in ninth place for $255,000 as the last woman standing.
David Pelosi was eliminated in eighth place, good for $325,000, putting the tournament on the official final table bubble. The table remained seven-handed for quite some time before Graeme Newman five-bet jammed a 31-big blind stack with K♠Q♠, only to be called from Porbandarwala's superior A♣Q♥.
Newman would turn a flush draw, but he bricked the river and was out in seventh place for $415,000. That catapulted Porbandarwala into an even larger chip leader than he was in before the hand. It also brought an end to the session.
The remaining players are all guaranteed to take home at least $540,000. But they'd all love to win that $2,528,000 first-place prize, or at least one of the three seven-figure paydays up for grabs.
Porbandarwala, the only WPT Champions Club member at the final table, won the WPT Online Poker Open in Dec. 2020. He's also a World Series of Poker (WSOP) bracelet winner, 12-time World Series of Poker Circuit (WSOPC) ring winner, and had over $2.2 million in The Hendon Mob cashes prior to registering for the WPT World Championship.
The six finalists will take a day off to rest before returning to Wynn on Sunday for the livestreamed one-day final table.
*Images courtesy of the World Poker Tour.
