Denisov Leads Last 200 After Day 2 of the MILLIONS Main Event in Sochi; Filatov Among Big Stacks
Day 2 of the 2018 partypoker LIVE MILLIONS Russia Main Event is in the books and as expected, the money bubble was not reached during the eight levels of play with the improved and slower tournament structure. Fewer than 700 entries were on the clocks when the action got back underway at the stunning Sochi Casino and Resort with 367 players having carried over stacks from the three live Day 1s at the venue.
The re-entry and registration period was open for another four levels and the live satellite winners and online Day 1 winners all took their seats, joined by several hopefuls that wanted to take a shot at the guaranteed prize pool of RUB300,000,000. Once the registration officially closed, the number of entries had climbed to 916 in total and the casualties kept coming at a quick pace to reduce the field to the last 200 at the end of level 16.
Aleksandr Denisov shot towards the top of the counts after claiming two big pots in the last level of the night and bagged up an impressive 19,035,000. Denisov arrived in the Triton Poker room with around 8.5 million and proceeded to knock out Josef Snejberg and Nikolay Dementiev in quick succession. Snejberg jammed the river of an ace-high board with the nut flush blocker and Denisov called with the second nut flush, he then turned a ten-high straight with eight-seven against the flopped set of tens of Dementiev to cement his top spot.
Second in chips is Aleksei Istomin with 15,355,000 followed by Oleg Netaliev with 14,630,000. Istomin usually calls Barcelona his home but already took part in the inaugural partypoker LIVE MILLIONS festival in Sochi in 2017. Netaliev spent the last two levels on the feature table along with Niall Farrell, partypoker ambassador Ludovic Geilich and defending champion Aleksandr Gofman. While Gofman (4,800,000) and Farrell (4,310,000) advanced to Day 3, Geilich was ousted in the last level of the day when his jack-ten suited could not beat the ace-queen of Richard Hasnir. Fellow partypoker ambassadors Bertrand "ElkY" Grospellier and Open runner-up Dzmitry Urbanovich were eliminated on Day 2, their teammates Anatoly Filatov (8,240,000) and Philipp Gruissem (4,280,000) both advanced.
Other big stacks and notables still in contention for the top prize of RUB60,000,000 include Andrey Kotelnikov (10,280,000), Michael Sklenicka (9,335,000), Denis Pisarev (8,800,000), Andrey Pateychuk (8,725,000), Day 1A chip leader Oleksii Kravchuk (7,980,000), Vadim Lipovka (7,600,000), Maxim Lykov (6,750,000), Vladimir Shchemelev (6,740,000), Igor Yaroshevskyy (6,535,000), Ionut-Flavius Voinea (5,975,000), 2017 third-place finisher Aleksandr Merzhvinskiy (4,850,000) and MILLIONS Nottingham champion Maria Lampropulos (3,800,000).
Among those to bust without anything to show for were Kiryl Radzivonau, Mihails Morozovs, Dmitry Vitkind, Alexander Lakhov, Daria Feshchenko, Bartlomiej Machon, Andrey Zaichenko, David Urban, Leonid Bilokur, Anton Yakuba, Dietrich Fast, Rickie Silcock and Finnish superstar Patrik Antonius. Most of them may take another shot at glory here in Sochi in the upcoming High Roller, however, and the players party in the mypartypokerlive lounge also awaits to drain the sorrows.
Day 3 of the Main Event will recommence at 12 p.m. noon local time with level 17 and blinds of 35,000/70,000 with a running ante of 70,000. All tables will continue eight-handed and the 30-second shot clock will be introduced one table off the money. Only the top 119 spots will get paid and the PokerNews live reporting team will be there to provide all the action from the floor. Furthermore, two feature tables will run on a security delay of 30 minutes with hole cards up.
2018 partypoker LIVE MILLIONS Russia Main Event Day 3 Seat Draw
| Table | Seat | Player | Country | Chip Count | Big Blinds |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1 | Vladimir Shchemelev | Russia | 6,740,000 | 84 |
| 1 | 2 | Ivan Kruglov | Russia | 2,515,000 | 31 |
| 1 | 3 | Ramin Boyazitov | Russia | 6,830,000 | 85 |
| 1 | 4 | Aliaksei Militsa | Belarus | 2,070,000 | 26 |
| 1 | 5 | Vyacheslav Nikulin | Russia | 4,260,000 | 53 |
| 1 | 6 | Rustem Muratov | Russia | 6,120,000 | 77 |
| 1 | 7 | Artem Metalidi | Ukraine | 5,275,000 | 66 |
| 1 | 8 | Yunus Tuguz | Russia | 1,420,000 | 18 |
| 2 | 1 | Vitaliy Gusak | Russia | 1,850,000 | 23 |
| 2 | 2 | Koray Aldemir | Germany | 3,925,000 | 49 |
| 2 | 3 | Garri Tevosov | Russia | 8,000,000 | 100 |
| 2 | 4 | Konstantin Nikulin | Russia | 3,560,000 | 45 |
| 2 | 5 | Vojtech Skalak | Czech Republic | 4,040,000 | 51 |
| 2 | 6 | Artem Vezhenkov | Russia | 2,100,000 | 26 |
| 2 | 7 | Leonid Orman | Russia | 9,545,000 | 119 |
| 2 | 8 | Mikhail Ruslanov | Russia | 2,290,000 | 29 |
| 3 | 1 | Vitaliy Volov | Russia | 1,400,000 | 18 |
| 3 | 2 | Dmitriy Ponomarev | Russia | 3,700,000 | 46 |
| 3 | 3 | Aleksandr Merzhvinskiy | Russia | 4,850,000 | 61 |
| 3 | 4 | Ekaterina Vorobieva | Russia | 6,100,000 | 76 |
| 3 | 5 | Maxim Lykov | Russia | 6,750,000 | 84 |
| 3 | 6 | Konstantin Puchkov | Russia | 2,865,000 | 36 |
| 3 | 7 | Andrey Chernokoz | Russia | 5,080,000 | 64 |
| 3 | 8 | Rinat Enkov | Russia | 6,500,000 | 81 |
| 4 | 1 | Saar Wilf | Israel | 1,750,000 | 22 |
| 4 | 2 | Richard Hasnir | United Kingdom | 5,350,000 | 67 |
| 4 | 3 | Boris Bruskin | Russia | 4,805,000 | 60 |
| 4 | 4 | Aleksandr Chernikov | Russia | 11,145,000 | 139 |
| 4 | 5 | Andrey Razov | Russia | 3,030,000 | 38 |
| 4 | 6 | Vladimir Skubko | Russia | 4,225,000 | 53 |
| 4 | 7 | Sergey Zybin | Russia | 4,430,000 | 55 |
| 4 | 8 | Arseniy Karmatskiy | Russia | 1,760,000 | 22 |
| 5 | 1 | Ilyaz Dosikov | Russia | 2,800,000 | 35 |
| 5 | 2 | Nikolay Fal | Russia | 2,675,000 | 33 |
| 5 | 3 | Mikhail Galitskiy | Russia | 5,910,000 | 74 |
| 5 | 4 | Martin Hogarty | United Kingdom | 2,300,000 | 29 |
| 5 | 5 | Matous Houzvicek | Czech Republic | 2,680,000 | 34 |
| 5 | 6 | Andrey Pateychuk | Russia | 8,725,000 | 109 |
| 5 | 7 | Vage Melikyan | Armenia | 2,755,000 | 34 |
| 5 | 8 | Egor Evsin | Russia | 9,740,000 | 122 |
| 6 | 1 | Aleksey Shaburov | Russia | 6,820,000 | 85 |
| 6 | 2 | Anton Petrov | Russia | 1,240,000 | 16 |
| 6 | 3 | Oleg Semenov | Russia | 7,875,000 | 98 |
| 6 | 4 | Evgeniy Sboev | Russia | 2,705,000 | 34 |
| 6 | 5 | Viktor Mukhin | Russia | 7,060,000 | 88 |
| 6 | 6 | Natalya Yakovleva | Russia | 1,675,000 | 21 |
| 6 | 7 | Vahe Martirosyan | Armenia | 1,630,000 | 20 |
| 6 | 8 | Roman Verenko | Ukraine | 6,915,000 | 86 |
| 7 | 1 | Dmitriy Agafonov | Russia | 3,065,000 | 38 |
| 7 | 2 | Sergey Aristov | Russia | 6,275,000 | 78 |
| 7 | 3 | Vladimir Martinov | Russia | 1,695,000 | 21 |
| 7 | 4 | Vlada Stojanovic | Serbia | 885,000 | 11 |
| 7 | 5 | Konstantin Maslak | Russia | 6,715,000 | 84 |
| 7 | 6 | Svyatoslav Topala | Russia | 2,770,000 | 35 |
| 7 | 7 | Stanislav Voskresenskiy | Russia | 7,840,000 | 98 |
| 7 | 8 | Pavel Gavrish | Russia | 4,125,000 | 52 |
| 8 | 1 | Tyler Goatcher | United Kingdom | 1,945,000 | 24 |
| 8 | 2 | Anton Pronin | Russia | 4,050,000 | 51 |
| 8 | 3 | Viktor Kudinov | Russia | 7,300,000 | 91 |
| 8 | 4 | Shukhrat Salikhov | Uzbekistan | 3,555,000 | 44 |
| 8 | 5 | Dmitry Yurasov | Russia | 4,125,000 | 52 |
| 8 | 6 | Armen Khachatryan | Russia | 2,735,000 | 34 |
| 8 | 7 | Timothy Adams | Canada | 2,015,000 | 25 |
| 8 | 8 | Oleg Vasylchenko | Ukraine | 1,775,000 | 22 |
| 9 | 1 | Colin Mctaggart | United Kingdom | 4,700,000 | 59 |
| 9 | 2 | Alexsandr Gukov | Russia | 7,200,000 | 90 |
| 9 | 3 | Jessica Pilkington | United Kingdom | 3,030,000 | 38 |
| 9 | 4 | Evgeniy Nekrasov | Russia | 2,545,000 | 32 |
| 9 | 5 | Grigory Chaus | Russia | 2,455,000 | 31 |
| 9 | 6 | Andrey Litvinov | Russia | 1,400,000 | 18 |
| 9 | 7 | Aleksandr Ilin | Russia | 3,525,000 | 44 |
| 9 | 8 | Maksim Skripkin | Russia | 2,130,000 | 27 |
| 38 | 1 | Aibek Lekerov | Kazakhstan | 2,005,000 | 25 |
| 38 | 2 | Brandon Sheils | United Kingdom | 2,535,000 | 32 |
| 38 | 3 | Aliaksandr Hirs | Belarus | 7,220,000 | 90 |
| 38 | 4 | Vyacheslav Goryachev | Russia | 7,670,000 | 96 |
| 38 | 5 | Manig Loeser | Germany | 995,000 | 12 |
| 38 | 6 | Pavel Zuev | Russia | 12,300,000 | 154 |
| 38 | 7 | Andrii Novak | Ukraine | 4,135,000 | 52 |
| 38 | 8 | Mikhail Aleksandrov | Russia | 5,780,000 | 72 |
| 39 | 1 | Ramil Mavletyanov | Russia | 1,695,000 | 21 |
| 39 | 2 | Alexandr Shuvalov | Russia | 925,000 | 12 |
| 39 | 3 | Joshua Jones | United Kingdom | 6,350,000 | 79 |
| 39 | 4 | Liliya Novikova | Russia | 1,175,000 | 15 |
| 39 | 5 | Alexandr Labunskiy | Russia | 6,235,000 | 78 |
| 39 | 6 | Gleb Tremzin | Russia | 4,080,000 | 51 |
| 39 | 7 | Maksim Panyak | Russia | 5,850,000 | 73 |
| 39 | 8 | Nikita Bochkin | Russia | 2,000,000 | 25 |
| 40 | 1 | Aleksandr Gofman | Russia | 4,800,000 | 60 |
| 40 | 2 | Michael Sklenicka | Czech Republic | 9,335,000 | 117 |
| 40 | 3 | Vladimir Pilyavskiy | Ukraine | 5,655,000 | 71 |
| 40 | 4 | Maksim Haitsiukevich | Belarus | 1,625,000 | 20 |
| 40 | 5 | Aleksandr Babich | Russia | 710,000 | 9 |
| 40 | 6 | Sergei Zvorygin | Russia | 1,020,000 | 13 |
| 40 | 7 | Mikhail Surin | Russia | 4,150,000 | 52 |
| 40 | 8 | Pavel Kireev | Russia | 11,750,000 | 147 |
| 41 | 1 | Ionut-Flavius Voinea | Romania | 5,975,000 | 75 |
| 41 | 2 | Konstantin Uspenskii | Russia | 3,970,000 | 50 |
| 41 | 3 | Vitaliy Li | Russia | 2,550,000 | 32 |
| 41 | 4 | Chin Wei Lim | Malaysia | 8,430,000 | 105 |
| 41 | 5 | Oleg Pavlyuchuk | Russia | 4,325,000 | 54 |
| 41 | 6 | Viktor Khodorenko | Belarus | 8,835,000 | 110 |
| 41 | 7 | Kirill Kruglov | Russia | 1,530,000 | 19 |
| 41 | 8 | Arkadiy Stekolshchikov | Russia | 9,775,000 | 122 |
| 42 | 1 | Sergey Blagodarniy | Russia | 7,000,000 | 88 |
| 42 | 2 | Grigoriy Rodin | Russia | 2,090,000 | 26 |
| 42 | 3 | Vladislav Solovyev | Russia | 6,810,000 | 85 |
| 42 | 4 | Aliaksei Boika | Belarus | 3,755,000 | 47 |
| 42 | 5 | Hadi Khordbin | Iran | 6,160,000 | 77 |
| 42 | 6 | Maria Lampropulos | Argentina | 3,800,000 | 48 |
| 42 | 7 | Maksin Misura | Russia | 4,365,000 | 55 |
| 42 | 8 | Ivan Adamenka | Belarus | 3,385,000 | 42 |
| 43 | 1 | Niall Farrell | Scotland | 4,310,000 | 54 |
| 43 | 2 | Ivan Arbatskiy | Russia | 6,230,000 | 78 |
| 43 | 3 | Petr Bartagov | Russia | 5,150,000 | 64 |
| 43 | 4 | Igor Ovcharenko | Russia | 7,055,000 | 88 |
| 43 | 5 | Sedrak Bagdasaryan | Russia | 1,115,000 | 14 |
| 43 | 6 | Igor Devkin | Russia | 2,850,000 | 36 |
| 43 | 7 | Oleg Netaliev | Russia | 14,630,000 | 183 |
| 43 | 8 | Igor Yaroshevskyy | Ukraine | 6,535,000 | 82 |
| 44 | 1 | Dmitry Gromov | Russia | 3,245,000 | 41 |
| 44 | 2 | Anatoliy Shershnev | Russia | 5,100,000 | 64 |
| 44 | 3 | Aleksei Gorodnichev | Russia | 1,430,000 | 18 |
| 44 | 4 | Alexey Vandyshev | Russia | 1,825,000 | 23 |
| 44 | 5 | Oleksii Kravchuk | Ukraine | 7,980,000 | 100 |
| 44 | 6 | Anatoly Filatov | Russia | 8,240,000 | 103 |
| 44 | 7 | Nikolay Evdokimov | Russia | 1,205,000 | 15 |
| 44 | 8 | Gennadiy Ozhigin | Russia | 1,745,000 | 22 |
| 45 | 1 | Vladislav Vinagradov | Russia | 2,195,000 | 27 |
| 45 | 2 | Jack Sinclair | United Kingdom | 5,780,000 | 72 |
| 45 | 3 | Dirk Bueker | Germany | 3,050,000 | 38 |
| 45 | 4 | Marius Kudzmanas | Lithuania | 5,000,000 | 63 |
| 45 | 5 | Roman Zhuravlev | Russia | 5,000,000 | 63 |
| 45 | 6 | Andrey Ivlev | Russia | 3,285,000 | 41 |
| 45 | 7 | Said Butba | Russia | 4,745,000 | 59 |
| 45 | 8 | Viktor Ustimov | Russia | 6,400,000 | 80 |
| 46 | 1 | Nikita Kalinin | Russia | 3,310,000 | 41 |
| 46 | 2 | Maksim Pak | Russia | 4,280,000 | 54 |
| 46 | 3 | Philipp Gruissem | Germany | 4,280,000 | 54 |
| 46 | 4 | Robbie Robinson | United Kingdom | 3,685,000 | 46 |
| 46 | 5 | Sergey Kerzhakov | Russia | 4,685,000 | 59 |
| 46 | 6 | Oleg Titov | Russia | 4,970,000 | 62 |
| 46 | 7 | Alexander Zubov | Russia | 7,000,000 | 88 |
| 46 | 8 | Gytis Lazauninkas | Lithuania | 6,930,000 | 87 |
| 47 | 1 | Gor Kazaryan | Russia | 5,760,000 | 72 |
| 47 | 2 | Igor Kozhevnikov | Russia | 1,800,000 | 23 |
| 47 | 3 | Victor Shener | Russia | 3,100,000 | 39 |
| 47 | 4 | Vitaliy Avanesyan | Russia | 2,000,000 | 25 |
| 47 | 5 | Aleksandr Levashov | Russia | 740,000 | 9 |
| 47 | 6 | Alexey Melnikov | Russia | 9,675,000 | 121 |
| 47 | 7 | Aliaksandr Shylko | Belarus | 2,350,000 | 29 |
| 47 | 8 | Jeff Hakim | United States | 1,700,000 | 21 |
| 48 | 1 | Andrey Malyshev | Russia | 1,840,000 | 23 |
| 48 | 2 | Aleksandr Mikhalev | Russia | 7,895,000 | 99 |
| 48 | 3 | Viacheslav Zhukov | Russia | 7,100,000 | 89 |
| 48 | 4 | Boris Yanpolskiy | Russia | 3,730,000 | 47 |
| 48 | 5 | Aleksandr Denisov | Russia | 19,035,000 | 238 |
| 48 | 6 | Maksim Reshetov | Russia | 3,000,000 | 38 |
| 48 | 7 | Robert Faizrakhmanov | Russia | 5,935,000 | 74 |
| 48 | 8 | Joseph Parsons | United Kingdom | 5,745,000 | 72 |
| 49 | 1 | Lavrentiy Ni | Kazakhstan | 3,505,000 | 44 |
| 49 | 2 | Teodor Evrastiev | Bulgaria | 4,065,000 | 51 |
| 49 | 3 | Thomas Williams | United Kingdom | 2,275,000 | 28 |
| 49 | 4 | Pavel Veksler | Ukraine | 1,730,000 | 22 |
| 49 | 5 | Denis Pisarev | Russia | 8,800,000 | 110 |
| 49 | 6 | Ivan Miheev | Russia | 855,000 | 11 |
| 49 | 7 | Maksim Bura | Russia | 3,920,000 | 49 |
| 49 | 8 | Andrejs Perederjevs | Latvia | 230,000 | 3 |
| 50 | 1 | Iliya Iliyaguev | Russia | 5,480,000 | 69 |
| 50 | 2 | Sergey Chaban | Russia | 4,840,000 | 61 |
| 50 | 3 | Alimbay Sultanov | Kazakhstan | 8,660,000 | 108 |
| 50 | 4 | Andrey Kozlov | Russia | 3,505,000 | 44 |
| 50 | 5 | Aben Zholgaliev | Kazakhstan | 2,105,000 | 26 |
| 50 | 6 | Jiri Horak | Czech Republic | 1,220,000 | 15 |
| 50 | 7 | Ekaterina Fedyaeva | Russia | 9,560,000 | 120 |
| 50 | 8 | Asker Aloev | Russia | 1,570,000 | 20 |
| 51 | 1 | Andrey Kotelnikov | Russia | 10,280,000 | 129 |
| 51 | 2 | Shyngis Satubayev | Kazakhstan | 5,760,000 | 72 |
| 51 | 3 | Yury Tuzov | Belarus | 1,395,000 | 17 |
| 51 | 4 | Aymon Hata | United Kingdom | 3,925,000 | 49 |
| 51 | 5 | Vladimir Troyanovskiy | Russia | 4,110,000 | 51 |
| 51 | 6 | Sergey Terentyev | Russia | 4,350,000 | 54 |
| 51 | 7 | Diego Zeiter | Switzerland | 1,420,000 | 18 |
| 51 | 8 | Roman Timergazin | Russia | 1,255,000 | 16 |
| 52 | 1 | Gleb Kovtunov | Ukraine | 1,565,000 | 20 |
| 52 | 2 | Anton Sazonau | Belarus | 8,000,000 | 100 |
| 52 | 3 | Aleksandr Kuzmin | Russia | 1,845,000 | 23 |
| 52 | 4 | Vladimir Drokin | Ukraine | 1,820,000 | 23 |
| 52 | 5 | Sergey Pichugin | Russia | 4,665,000 | 58 |
| 52 | 6 | Ivan Utemov | Russia | 3,605,000 | 45 |
| 52 | 7 | Sergey Lomakin | Russia | 1,655,000 | 21 |
| 52 | 8 | Aleksey Istomin | Russia | 15,355,000 | 192 |
| 53 | 1 | Andrey Bondar | Russia | 2,385,000 | 30 |
| 53 | 2 | Beka Iordanishvili | Ukraine | 3,200,000 | 40 |
| 53 | 3 | Anatolii Zyrin | Russia | 3,790,000 | 47 |
| 53 | 4 | Daniyar Aubakirov | Kazakhstan | 4,970,000 | 62 |
| 53 | 5 | Timur Khamidullin | Russia | 3,305,000 | 41 |
| 53 | 6 | Vadim Lipovka | Belarus | 7,600,000 | 95 |
| 53 | 7 | Luke Thursfield | United Kingdom | 7,000,000 | 88 |
| 53 | 8 | Jonas Kuznik | Czech Republic | 4,395,000 | 55 |
. He found one opponent in Richard Hasnir with the 
in the hijack and the board of 
sent the Scotsman to the rail.
and the aces held up.
and Snejberg moved all in from the small blind for 3.245 million and Denisov gave it some thought before calling. Snejberg rolled over the 
for the nut flush blocker and Denisov scooped the massive pot with 
for the second nut flush.
, and Gytis Lazauninkas had checked from early position to Waheed Ashraf on the button, who bet 225,000. Ashraf had about 1.3m behind him and Lazauninkas, who had him covered, moved all in. Ashraf needed a minute to think before he decided to call. 
to give Lazauninkas a surprise set and a lock on the pot to eliminate Ashraf.
, quickly called to put his opponent at risk for 945,000.
for 575,000 and Jack Sinclair called in the big blind with 
. The 
flop, Yaroshevskyy checked and Pateychuk claimed the pot with a continuation bet of 225,000.
when Niall Farrell bet 700,000 into a pot of around 800,000. 
for a flush and took down the pot after Chesnokov mucked. The Scot is now up to 3.3m in chips after previously having a slow start to the Main Event in yesterday's Day 1c when he fired two bullets unsuccessfully.
