Raoul Kanme Bursts Final Table Bubble to Take Control of $25,500 Onyx Main Event

After a pulsating day of action inside the Merit Royal Diamond Hotel Casino & Spa, the $25,500 Main Event has reached its final table, with just nine players remaining in contention for the title. The penultimate day of the Onyx High Roller Series event began with 38 players returning to the felt, but that number quickly dropped, with just four hours of play logged before the day concluded.

Shortly after play got underway, it was announced that the 255-strong field had generated a prize pool of $6,120,000. While all the players returning for the day had already secured their place in the money, it was revealed that $1,250,000 would await the eventual champion.

Returning to the final table closest to that prize, Raoul Kanme was one of only two players to end the day with more than 100 big blinds. Kanme put his chips to use on the final table bubble, getting a preflop five-bet through against Ravi Sheth. Shortly after, he finished the job, sending Sheth crashing out just shy of the final nine, with those chips propelling him to the chip lead.

Right behind Kanme on the leaderboard, high-stakes regular Daniel Rezaei finished the day with 10,210,000, just a handful of big blinds behind the chip leader. The Austrian representation on the overnight podium doesn't end with Rezaei, as Manuel Fritz bagged 6,880,000 and will return to the final day in third place.

Final Table Seat Draw

Seat	Player	Country	Chip Count	Big Blinds
1	Italo Modena	Italy	2,750,000	28
2	Jordan Woodall	Germany	4,785,000	48
3	Raoul Kanme	Netherlands	10,830,000	108
4	Manuel Fritz	Austria	6,880,000	69
5	Fahredin Mustafov	Bulgaria	260,000	3
6	Aliaksandr Shylko	Belarus	6,525,000	65
7	Anze Smajd	Slovenia	5,445,000	54
8	Daniel Rezaei	Austria	10,210,000	102
9	Matthias Lipp	Austria	3,285,000	33

Elsewhere in the final-table counts, start-of-day chip leader Jordan Woodall bagged 4,785,000 and will return in the middle of the pack when play resumes. Day 1c chip leader Italo Modena also made it through, ending the day with 2,750,000, which gives him 28 big blinds to work with.

At the bottom end of the counts is the other starting flight leader, Fahredin Mustafov. The Bulgarian won this very event 12 months ago, but faces a very different challenge this time around, having made the final table with just 2.5 big blinds.

Day 2 Action

As turned out to be the narrative for the day, the action came thick and fast from the off, with chips flying and eliminations coming from the very first hand. Aleksandras Rusinovas was the first to hit the rail; the lone casualty of a three-way all-in, his elimination set the tone for the rest of the day.

By the first break, roughly 90 minutes into the day, just 20 players remained, with David Coleman (33rd), Matthew Wantman (28th), Sondre Stormyr (27th) and Nicholas Seward (26th) among those to hit the rail. Stormyr and Seward both fell in the same hand, with Fritz coming out on top of a three-way all-in.

Mikalai Vaskaboinikau's elimination took the field to the first break of the day, and there was no let-up when play resumed.

The next 90 minutes saw another nine players fall, including several World Series of Poker bracelet winners, as Aleksejs Ponakovs (19th), Boris Kolev (17th), Sergio Aido (16th), Eelis Parssinen (14th) and Weiran Pu (12th) all joined the rail.

Those eliminations left the field just two places from the official final table, and it quickly became one when, ten minutes later, Danilo Velasevic was eliminated in 11th place.

The final-table bubble then became the Sheth show. The only player at risk during the bubble was Sheth, not once but twice. The first time, he managed to double through Anze Smajd, but after an hour of hand-for-hand play, with nobody else finding themselves at risk, Sheth was all in again. This time, though, he could not survive, losing a huge flip to Kanme, who would go on to finish the day as chip leader.

Sheth's elimination brought the day's action to an end, with the remaining nine players bagging their chips and securing their places at the final table.

The final day will begin at 1 p.m. local time on August 14, with each of the nine players guaranteed $143,000 and just eight eliminations standing between them and the title and the $1,250,000 top prize.