With 32,000 in the middle and the flop showing , Victor Ilyukhin Senior jammed for 62,100 and Arvin Vahdat called from one seat over for most of his chips.
Victor Ilyukhin:
Arvin Vahdat:
The turn changed nothing but the river improved Ilyukhin to a flush.
Kelly Saxby got her short stack in with pocket fours and her opponent called with jacks. A four on the flop gave a reason for hope but running queens delivered a set on the board and the jacks had the superior full house.
Right after, the clocks were stopped and the final two hands of the night were announced.
George Demetriou was all in for the last few big blinds with and picked up a call by an opponent with . Demetriou spiked a seven-high straight on the turn and climbed back above the starting hand.
One table over, Sang Leung raised to 3,500 from under the gun and Tamer Kamel called on the button. Gary Bertram jammed the big blind and Leung reshoved, Kamel folded.
Fewer than 80 players have bagged up for the night on Day 1d while the turbo heat 1e is nearing the final half an hour of play with 27 players out of 41 entries remaining. The full chip counts for the final two flights and a recap of today's action are to follow.
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The final two starting days of the 2019 888poker LIVE Festival London £1,100 Main Event have wrapped up at the Aspers Casino at Westfield Stratford City and the field size has increased to 506 total entries thanks to the far-biggest flight for the flagship tournament of the festival.
After three previous starting days, 261 entries had set the event on track to meet the £500,000 guarantee and Day 1d turned out to attract 165 unique players. Along with 39 re-entries, an additional 204 were added to the equation and the final turbo heat 1e pushed it up further thanks to 38 unique players and three re-entries.
The five starting days at a glance
Day
Unique Players
Re-Entries
Total Entries
Survivors
1a
52
6
58
13
1b
62
14
76
24
1c
111
16
127
49
1d
165
39
204
79
1e
38
3
41
19
2
?
Total
506
184
Following the trend of the previous flights, Day 1d bagged up slightly more than one-third of the field as 79 hopefuls punched their tickets for Day 2. Nikolay Ponomarev came out on top with 222,500 but Matthew Anderson trailed him by fewer than one big blind with a stack of 221,500. Third in chips is Frenchman Maxime Chilaud (192,000), a single chip ahead of Craig Smith (191,500).
Ponomarev had already tried his luck in previous flights without success and Day 1d turned out to be the charm. In the penultimate level of the night, Ponomarev sent Serkan Ersoy to the rail who flat-called a raise and then four-bet jammed for almost 80 big blinds with pocket sixes. He was called by Ponomarev with pocket eights and neither player hit anything on the board.
Chilaud won the second-biggest pot of the day just before heading into the final break of the night at the end of level nine. In a three-bet pot he flopped top pair with ace-queen and fired three barrels to get hero-called eventually by Richard Kellett with pocket tens. Kellett dropped to half the starting stack but still made it through to Day 2 thanks to a late surge, as he claimed 128,500 to his name.
Top five counts after Day 1d
Place
Player
Country
Chip Count
1
Nikolay Ponomarev
Russia
222,500
2
Matthew Anderson
United Kingdom
221,500
3
Maxime Chilaud
France
192,000
4
Craig Smith
United Kingdom
191,500
5
Anthony Andreou
United Kingdom
171,000
Other notables from Day 1d with a big stack include Anthony Andreou (171,000), Victor Ilyukhin Sr (153,000), Adrian Constantin (147,500), Nicholas Lee (106,000), Christopher Yong (101,000), Sang Leung (99,000), Vamshi Vandanapu (87,500) and William Kassouf (76,500) to name just a few.
The long list of casualties, unfortunately, included the 888poker ambassadors Kara Scott and Ana Marquez, the former came up short on the live stream table. Furthermore, James Mitchell, Kelly Saxby, Alexios Zervos, Sebastian Gohr, Natalia Breviglieri, Javier Zarco, Ryan Mandara, Kevin Allen and Brandon Shiels were all eliminated.
Local legend Albert Sapiano was the center of chip changes throughout the day as he took several attempts in order to run up a stack. His wild roller-coaster ride brought massive swings in quick succession and he would not bag up chips in either Day 1d and 1e respectively.
With regards to the final turbo heat, a moderate field of 41 total entries was cut down to 19 survivors in 11 levels of 20 minutes each. Antonis "Tony" Poulengeris more than quadrupled his starting stack to claim the honors of Day 1a chip leader with a stack of 124,0000. Neophytos Neophytou (106,000), former football striker Steve Watts (68,500), Brandon Sheils (59,500) and Carl Shaw (37,500) used their last chance.
Top five counts after Day 1e
Place
Player
Country
Chip Count
1
Antonis Poulengeris
United Kingdom
124,000
2
Jose Planells
Spain
116,500
3
Neophytos Neophytou
United Kingdom
106,000
4
Stephen Buxton
United Kingdom
96,500
5
Paul Grummitt
United Kingdom
94,000
The field size is not set yet as the late registration and re-entry period remains open until the cards go back in the air for Day 2 as of 2 p.m. local time on Sunday, December 1st, 2019. The money bubble will be reached and the field is expected to get whittled down to the final three tables or fewer as the level duration increases to 60 minutes each for the remainder of the tournament.
A live stream with hole cards displayed on a 30-minute security delay will be available on the 888poker YouTube channel after the first break of the day and the PokerNews team will provide all the action from the tables until the 888poker LIVE circuit has crowned a new champion.