Chip leader Arjan van Bavel opened from early position before Claudio Di Vitto jammed all-in for 51,500 from the cutoff. The action folded back to Van Bavel, who quickly made the call.
Claudio Di Vitto: K♠J♠
Arjan van Bavel: A♠7♠
"Winner", claimed Di Vitto before any community cards were dealt. However, the flopped flush draw on 8♠10♠5♦ was no good for Di Vitto, as Van Bavel had the higher spades. So when the turn fell A♥, Di Vitto had no outs left.
The meaningless river of K♦ gave him a consolation pair and he tried to tip the dealer a coin in the local currency before leaving the tournament area.
Meanwhile, Van Bavel extended his chip lead and is now playing over ten times the starting stack.
On outer tables, Sandro Beisch and Maureen Bloechlinger also busted.
"Turi" got all of their chips in versus "Lucky Luke" in a blind-on-blind encounter. "Lucky Luke" had the covering stack and the cards went open.
"Turi": A♥Q♠
"Lucky Luke": A♦5♥
The board ran out 10♥J♦5♠9♠4♦, and for a while "Turi" missed the fact that "Lucky Luke" had indeed gotten his lucky five. When it finally dawned upon him, he swiftly left the table while talking to another player about what had transpired.
Only 28 players still remain in Day 1e, which is entering its final stage.
Action was caught on the turn in a pot of 33,000, where the board read [6sjs9d2hArjan van Bavel was on the button and bet 27,000 after a check from Andrea Roner. Roner then raised to 65,000 before Bavel made the call.
The river fell the 5♦ and Roner put a big stack of T-5,000 chips forward for a bet of 105,000. Van Bavel thought for a bit before announcing ''all-in''. Roner played about 130,000 back, and did not like the predicament he found himself in. Ultimately, though, he put in the call.
Van Bavel immediately tabled his 8♠7♣ for a rivered straight. Roner angrily threw his K♠K♥ across the table before he evacuated the premises. Another huge pot for Van Bavel, whose stack is head and shoulders above any of that of his competitors.
With that, all tables have stopped play and are bagging their chips. Twenty-three players survived the onslaught and will return tomorrow at 4 p.m. for Day 2.
Those out of the 107 entries who did not make it still have a chance in Day 1f, which currently stands at 93 entries, or tomorrow in the turbo Day 1g.
Stay tuned for full chip counts and a recap of the day.
Day 1e of the The Hendon Mob Championship (THMC) Liechtenstein CHF 300 ($332) Main Event has reached its conclusion. The field shrunk from its original 107 entries to the 23 players who still stood tall at the end of the day. They will join the 63 players who already have conquered a seat in Day 2 on June 4th at 4 p.m. local time.
Tallest of them all, almost resembling the mountains surrounding Grand Casino Liechtenstein, was the Dutchman Arjan van Bavel. He managed to end up with not double, but triple the stack of his nearest rival. Bagging a gargantuan stack of 915,000 chips, Van Bavel will have over 150 big blinds at his disposal at the start of Day 2. The player that goes by "Esage" needed to console themself with a second place, taking a stack of 307,000 into Day 2. Meanwhile, Velimir Lozic, also from Switzerland, completes the podium and is the final player of Day 1e to end up with more than 300,000 chips, 301,000 to be exact.
Day 1c Top Ten Chip Count
Rank
Player
Country
Chip Count
Day 2 Big Blinds
1
Arjan van Bavel
Netherlands
915,000
153
2
"Esage"
Switzerland
307,000
51
3
Velimir Lozic
Switzerland
301,000
50
4
Tobias Heinsdorf
Germany
281,000
47
5
"83-83"
Switzerland
257,000
43
6
Bunjamin Raimi
256,000
43
7
Alessandro Morales
Italy
234,000
39
8
Aleksandar Pesic
Serbia
220,000
37
9
Roger Heim
Switzerland
212,000
35
10
Patrick Tober
Austria
209,000
35
Van Bavel started his meteoric rise by busting two-time bracelet winner Emil Bise in a bizarre hand in Level 8. From there on out, Van Bavel never looked back, eliminated several players, and even ended the day by shipping a pot of over 550,000 in the final minutes of Day 1e.
Van Bavel stands out in the crowd in Liechtenstein not only because of his towers of chips but also because he has traveled relatively far to the European microstate. Amongst mostly nationals of the neighboring Switzerland, Austria, Germany, and Italy, few foreigners can be found. However, he is not solely alone in the Alps, as the Serbian Aleksandar Pesic (220,000) and Bulgarian Martin Ganchev (69,000) also battled their way through Day 1e, albeit ending up with significantly shorter stacks.
At the time of writing, Day 1f is still ongoing and is boasting 98 entries in Level 7. Late registration is still open in that flight and PokerNews will provide an update on the final numbers before the start of the live report of Day 2 on June 4th. The turbo Day 1g is also still scheduled to start four hours before Day 2 kicks off, and will also be glossed over at that time. The CHF 200,000 guaranteed prize pool has not yet been hit, so some more players might travel to the Alps last minute in search of value.
As stated, PokerNews will be back on June 4th at 4 p.m. local time with the live report of Day 2 of the THMC Main Event here in Liechtenstein. At that time, the yet uncertain prize pool and payouts will also be confirmed. The plan is to play down to the final table during that day, so be sure to come back to this page at that time to not miss any of the exciting bubble-bursting action that is sure to abound.