With the tournament now inside the last hour of play for the day, players have clearly tightened up, looking to maintain their chip stacks so that they can come back for Day 2. It's been a quiet day generally, but things have definitely gotten noticeably quieter in the last twenty minutes.
One patten we've noticed from Gavin Griffin today is that he seems comfortable playing out of position, but will slow down on the river if he fires two bullets and gets called on both of them. That's what happened in a recent hand, where Griffin made flop and turn bets of 1,300 and 2,400. On the river, with the board showing , Griffin check-called a bet of 4,000. Upon being shown the red tens for two pair, jacks and tens, Griffin mucked.
After a series of preflop raises Marlon Goonawardana decided to shove all in for an additional 22,000 and Tom Rafferty made a huge call. It was the right one, as Rafferty's were in great shape against Goonawardana's ambitious .
That was, however, until the board fell giving Goonawardana a full house to double up to over 55,000, as Rafferty was left shaking his head as he slipped back to 75,000.
Jacek Markowski has been eliminated at the hands of Zhi Hong Ma after all the chips went in on a board , with Markowski's pocket tens trailing the of Ma.
The river bricked out and Markowski was sent to the rail as Ma climbs up to 45,000.
What is it about flush draws? They're so enticing, so seductive. Many players just can't get enough of them. Christopher Lee may be one such player. He was part of a five-way flop of . With about 7,500 in the pot, Lee was the first person to take a stab at the pot. He open-shoved for 21,000. Two players folded, bringing the action to Robert Bechava. He went into the tank for over a minute before asking for a count. Upon being informed of the amount of the bet, Bechava called and tabled . He was up against Lee's spade flush draw, . It didn't hit on the turn, but it did hit on the river.
Newly crowned 2008 World Champion Peter Eastgate has touched down in Australia for the very first time and is scheduled to play tomorrow on Day 1c. PokerNews' own Melissa Castello recently spent a few minutes chatting with Eastgate to find out what he's been up to since winning the world's biggest poker tournament in early November.
Raymond Rahme finished in third place at the 2007 World Series of Poker Main Event, earning $3 million in the process. His tally of cashes will not include an APPT Sydney cash; he was recently knocked out of the tournament by Andrew Scott, all in preflop for 7,900 total. Rahme's was dominated by Scott's and never caught up.