Main Event Day 1b | 2018 Unibet Open London

02-24-2018 01:00 UTC

Saderne Takes Over the Lead on Day 1b; Foord-Brown and Pertea Bag Big Stacks

Christian Zetzsche

Level 11 : 1,200/2,400, 400 ante

As expected the second starting day of the 2018 Unibet Open £990 Main Event at "The Vic" attracted a bigger field and ultimately saw 202 players in action in the heart of London. Along with the 147 entries of Day 1a, a field of 349 entries in total emerged in this Freezeout and the prize pool is set with £314,100, of which the top 47 spots will earn their share. The minimum cash is worth £1,870 while the winner walks home £65,580 richer and with the stunning Unibet Open champion's trophy in his bag.

After 11 levels of 60 minutes each, Day 1b saw it's field whittled down all the way to just 52 hopefuls, and combined with the 36 survivors of Day 1a, that makes for 88 remaining players for Day 2 at the Grosvenor Victoria Casino. All survivors will be combined on 11 eight-handed tables and the action is set to resume at 12 p.m. noon local time with level 12 and blinds of 1,500/3,000 and a running ante of 500.

The chip leader of Day 1b and new overall chip leader of the tournament is Jeremy Sardene, who soared all the way to the top with a massive stack of 302,000. Francis Foord-Brown, who finished 4th one year ago at this very venue for £23,000, is in a prime position once more for a big payday after bagging up 292,500. Sardene jumped into a big stack after winning a flip with pocket jacks against the ace-king of Benjamin Lebor and forced £2,200 High Roller champion Julien Sitbon into a big fold in the last level of the night to secure the top spot.

Other big stacks and notables after Day 1b include [Removed:402] (243,500), Marius Pertea (230,000), Gary Fisher (204,500), Yngve Steen (170,500), Preben Stokkan (161,500), Toni Ojala (120,000) and Daniel Laming (90,500), Julien Sitbon bagged up 10 big blinds for Day 2 with 31,000.

Pertea won the last Unibet Open Main Event on home soil in Bucharest and added a deep run at the WPT European Championship in Berlin one month ago. The Romanian cracked the pocket kings of Unibet Poker ambassador Rauno Tahvonen with ace-ten suited and scored a massive double with aces versus tens soon after versus Hong Wang to end the day with a big smile on the face.

It was a dark day for the Unibet Poker representatives as none of them made it through. The eSports Star Mark Purdy was among the first players to bust, and he would later be followed by Ian Simpson, Daiva Byrne and the two UnibetPoker.fr sponsored pros Alexandre Reard and Quentin Lecomte. The latter lost his stack in back-to-back hands in level nine and headed to the rail.

Former Unibet Open champions Martin Soukup and Peter Harkes, who celebrated his 30th birthday today, also ran out of chips. Other notables among the casualties of Day 1b were such familiar names as Benny Glaser, Steven Watts, Albert Sapiano, Kfir Ivgi, Matt Perrins and Richard "Chufty" Ashby.

Action for the penultimate tournament day here in London kicks off at noon and a maximum of 11 levels or down to the final table are scheduled, the Unibet Open players party also awaits in the late evening as well. Make sure to tune back in to find out who will reach the money.

2018 Unibet Open London Main Event Day 2 Seat Draw

Table	Seat	Player	Country	Chip Count	Big Blinds
4	1	Van Pham	United Kingdom	110,000	37
4	2	Redmond Toth	Hungary	66,000	22
4	3	Lorenc Boci	Albania	203,000	68
4	4	Thomas Cazayous	France	205,500	69
4	5	David Clark	United Kingdom	125,000	42
4	6	Joe Beevers	United Kingdom	59,000	20
4	7	Thomas Stocker	United Kingdom	31,500	11
4	8	Andrei Ciobanu	Romania	138,500	46

5	1	Laurent Polito	France	223,500	75
5	2	Gerald Ringe	United Kingdom	71,000	24
5	3	Krisztian Arvai	Hungary	72,500	24
5	4	Lukasz Cygan	Poland	57,000	19
5	5	Emil Brunnberg	Sweden	63,000	21
5	6	Benjamin Morrison	United Kingdom	57,500	19
5	7	Mads Elle	Norway	145,000	48
5	8	[Removed:402]	Lithuania	243,500	81

6	1	John Wind	Netherlands	119,000	40
6	2	Philip Schoenebaum	Germany	76,500	26
6	3	Sylvain Loosli	France	59,000	20
6	4	Augustine Nwaukoni	Nigeria	51,000	17
6	5	Tomas Martinsson	Sweden	176,000	59
6	6	Catherine Ivgi	United Kingdom	62,500	21
6	7	Tony Blanchandin	France	100,000	33
6	8	Jonas Ketelsen	Denmark	159,000	53

7	1	Florian Lanz	Switzerland	55,500	19
7	2	Daniel Laming	United Kingdom	90,500	30
7	3	Jonathan Schuman	United Kingdom	71,000	24
7	4	Clement Tripodi	France	275,000	92
7	5	Colin Heus	Netherlands	49,500	17
7	6	Robert Green	United Kingdom	57,500	19
7	7	Niko Raappana	Finland	95,000	32
7	8	Simonas Eigminas	Lithuania	32,500	11

8	1	Mike Hill	United Kingdom	53,500	18
8	2	Kyriakos Papadopoulos	Greece	34,000	11
8	3	Mohammed Suhail	United Kingdom	100,500	34
8	4	Jakob Tostesen	Denmark	106,500	36
8	5	Joseph Field	United Kingdom	146,500	49
8	6	Oliver White	United Kingdom	125,500	42
8	7	Nicolay Langfeldt	Norway	137,500	46
8	8	Juan Ares Gozalo	Spain	117,000	39

9	1	Orestis Kanakopoulos	Greece	75,500	25
9	2	Daniel Toffel	United Kingdom	205,000	68
9	3	Lennaert Joostens	Netherlands	95,500	32
9	4	Bhavin Khatri	United Kingdom	249,000	83
9	5	Thomas Wenner	Germany	136,500	46
9	6	Tobias Andersen	Denmark	170,500	57
9	7	Julien Sitbon	France	31,000	10
9	8	Toni Ojala	Finland	120,000	40

10	1	Jussi Vanhanen	Finland	209,000	70
10	2	Alvaras Baranauskas	Lithuania	93,500	31
10	3	Nicolas Proust	France	184,500	62
10	4	Antony Wickert	United Kingdom	158,000	53
10	5	Kasper Mellanen	Finland	57,000	19
10	6	Marius Pertea	Romania	230,000	77
10	7	Mounir Tajiou	Sweden	73,000	24
10	8	Toby Locke	United Kingdom	162,500	54

11	1	Karl Stark	Sweden	75,500	25
11	2	Erik Le Goff	France	105,000	35
11	3	Thomas Svendgaard	Denmark	75,000	25
11	4	Mahrdad Saffari	United Kingdom	96,000	32
11	5	John Heming	United Kingdom	91,500	31
11	6	Jeremy Saderne	France	302,000	101
11	7	Markus Heikkila	Sweden	28,500	10
11	8	Yngve Steen	Norway	170,500	57

12	1	Preben Stokkan	Norway	161,500	54
12	2	Dennis Lindmark	Sweden	28,000	9
12	3	Oystein Eileraas	Norway	171,500	57
12	4	Jari Mahonen	Finland	174,000	58
12	5	Nikolay Kostyrko	Ukraine	64,500	22
12	6	Erlend Grodal	Norway	171,000	57
12	7	Honglin Jiang	New Zealand	113,000	38
12	8	Peter Kaae	Denmark	226,500	76

13	1	Nicolas Cardyn	France	140,000	47
13	2	Gary Fisher	United Kingdom	204,500	68
13	3	Andreas Wiborg	Denmark	187,500	63
13	4	Radoslaw Matyjaszczyk	Poland	55,000	18
13	5	Dinarte De Sousa	Portugal	40,000	13
13	6	Mateusz Moolhuizen	Netherlands	79,000	26
13	7	Monica Vaka	Norway	80,500	27
13	8	Jari Suuronen	Finland	46,500	16

14	1	Aaron Woodcock	United Kingdom	62,500	21
14	2	Francis Foord-Brown	United Kingdom	292,500	98
14	3	Christopher Yong	United Kingdom	160,500	54
14	4	Jeremy Pantin	Trinidad and Tobago	106,500	36
14	5	Janice Phillips	United Kingdom	50,000	17
14	6	Gunnar Wedde	Norway	190,000	63
14	7	Nicolaj Bonnichsen	Denmark	102,000	34
14	8	Espen Uhlen Jorstad	Norway	144,500	48

Tags: Alexandre Reard Alvaras Baranauskas Benjamin Lebor Benny Glaser Christopher Yong Daiva Byrne Daniel Laming Gary Fisher Honglin Jiang Ian Simpson Jeremy Saderne Julien Sitbon Kfir Ivgi Marius Pertea Mark Purdy Martin Soukup Matt Perrins Oystein Eileraas Peter Harkes Preben Stokkan Quentin Lecomte Rauno Tahvonen Richard Ashby Steven Watts The Vic Thomas Cazayous Tomas Martinsson Yngve Steen

02-23-2018 22:40 UTC

Over and Out for Nguyen

Christian Zetzsche

Level 10 : 1,000/2,000, 300 ante

In a battle of the blinds, Nicolay Langfeldt was all in and at risk for 49,000 with the and Tran Nguyen had him at risk with the superior stack and . The board of provided the ace on the flop only for Langfeldt to river a set.

Nguyen grabbed his base cap, smashed it on the ground in frustration and was left with around 15,000.

The next hand, Langfeldt limped the button and Nguyen shoved the small blind, Langfeldt called immediately.

Tran Nguyen:
Nicolay Langfeldt:

Nguyen turned the better hand on and sarcastically added "king on the river" only for the exact card to come with the to send him to the rail.

Player	Chips	Progress
Nicolay Langfeldt	125,000	5,000
Tran Nguyen	Busted

Tags: Nicolay Langfeldt Tran Nguyen

02-23-2018 21:32 UTC

Quentin Lecomte Eliminated

Christian Zetzsche

Level 9 : 800/1,600, 200 ante

UnibetPoker.fr sponsored pro Quentin Lecomte three-bet shoved and got through with it before shoving again into a raise. This time, Mads Elle called all in for less, 16,800, and the initial raiser folded.

Lecomte had one over card with the while Elle turned over , the board came .

Lecomte then raised to 6,000 from under the gun with 4,000 behind and called the shove of Karl Stark.

Quentin Lecomte:
Karl Stark:

The battle of former Unibet Open Cannes champion versus runner up ended in favor of Stark on the board of .

Player	Chips	Progress
Karl Stark	62,000	-3,000
Mads Elle	42,000	42,000
Quentin Lecomte	Busted

Tags: Karl Stark Quentin Lecomte Mads Elle

02-23-2018 20:22 UTC

Stark Rides the Roller Coaster

Christian Zetzsche

Level 8 : 600/1,200, 200 ante

Benjamin Lebor four-bet all in for 58,000 with the and Karl Stark called with the for a big flip. The board came and Lebor held up to double into an above-aberage stack.

Prior to that, Colin Heus had doubled through Stark and had the Swede at risk soon after with short stack Tim Verheyen also joining the mix for the following three-way showdown:

Tim Verheyen:
Karl Stark:
Colin Heus:

Then board came and Verheyen was eliminated, while Stark doubled through Heus for 25,000.

Player	Chips	Progress
Benjamin Lebor	120,000	75,000
Karl Stark	65,000	-20,000
Colin Heus	65,000	35,000
Tim Verheyen	Busted

Tags: Benjamin Lebor Colin Heus Karl Stark Tim Verheyen

02-23-2018 20:17 UTC

Wang Blows Up to Vault Pertea Into Big Stack

Christian Zetzsche

Level 8 : 600/1,200, 200 ante

The board was all but rushed away while Hong Wang had to forfeit the vast majority of his stack to Marius Pertea, paying off the 88,000 of the 2017 Unibet Open Bucharest champion.

On a board of , Wang had put his hopes on the turn on pocket tens for a pair and a gutshot, but Pertea's held up thanks to the blank queen on the river. Wang was not covered just yet, but had very few chips left and busted right after.

Player	Chips	Progress
Marius Pertea	230,000	140,000
Hong Wang	Busted

Tags: Hong Wang Marius Pertea

02-23-2018 20:09 UTC

Tahvonen and Harkes Bust in Quick Succession

Christian Zetzsche

Level 8 : 600/1,200, 200 ante

Rauno Tahvonen three-bet all in out of the small blind for 19,000 with the and Marius Pertea called from early position with the . The board of provided top set for the Unibet Poker ambassador while Pertea turned the straight to send the Estonian to the rail.

Peter Harkes departed right after when he got his remaining chips in with . Orestis Kanakopoulos called with and the Dutchman failed to get there on a board of .

Player	Chips	Progress
Orestis Kanakopoulos	90,000	90,000
Marius Pertea	90,000	35,000
Peter Harkes	Busted
Rauno Tahvonen	Busted

Tags: Marius Pertea Orestis Kanakopoulos Peter Harkes Rauno Tahvonen

02-23-2018 16:52 UTC

Simpson No More; Cygan Doubles

Christian Zetzsche

Level 6 : 400/800, 100 ante

On a flop of , Lukasz Cygan was all in for 6,200 with the and the table neighbor Paul Dunne called with . The turn and river were both blanks and Cygan doubled.

At the same time, Ian Simpson was spotted leaving the tournament area. Mike Hill confirmed that the Unibet Poker ambassador came up short with versus despite flopping an additional gutshot on .

Player	Chips	Progress
Andrew Hills	105,000	15,000
Hong Wang	100,000
Mike Hill	72,000	13,000
Kfir Ivgi	57,000	27,000
Paul Dunne	48,000	-12,000
Lukasz Cygan	22,000	22,000
Daiva Byrne	14,000	5,000
Ian Simpson	Busted

Tags: Ian Simpson Lukasz Cygan Mike Hill Paul Dunne

02-23-2018 15:51 UTC

Jiang Busts Bean and Sejer

Christian Zetzsche

Level 5 : 300/600, 75 ante

Stephen Bean raised to 1,600 and was called by Peter Jaksland and Honglin Jiang. The small blind squeezed to 6,000 and folds followed all around the table.

Right after, Bean was all in for 6,100 and Jaksland called, as did Jiang. The flop of brought a bet of 4,000 by Jaksland and Jiang called. On the turn both players checked and Jaksland bet the river for 6,500. Jiang reluctantly called with and Jaksland was caught bluffing with the , Bean departed with .

It wouldn't take long for the next short stack to make a move, and Martin Sejer three-bet all in for 10,200. A third player was in the hand and Jiang tried to lure him in by asking for a count before calling, but that trap didn't snap.

Martin Sejer:
Honglin Jiang:

"One time please," Sejer asked and his voice disappeared on the flop. He could all but gasps "kings?" The turn and river were of no help and Jiang sent the second player in a row to the rail.

Player	Chips	Progress
Honglin Jiang	85,000	35,000
Peter Jaksland	50,000	8,000
Martin Sejer	Busted
Rickard Larsson	Busted
Stephen Bean	Busted

Tags: Honglin Jiang Martin Sejer Peter Jaksland Stephen Bean

02-23-2018 14:07 UTC

Sitbon Puts on a Big Show

Christian Zetzsche

Level 3 : 150/300, 25 ante

On the three-way flop of , Soran Talan in the small blind checked and Domien Fierens bet 1,500 in the hijack. Julien Sitbon raised to 5,100 and Talan called, Fierens folded.

Talan then bet the turn for 8,500 and Sitbon almost immediately moved all in. Talan asked for a count and the shove was for 32,000 in total, sending the Swede into the think tank. "I show you one card if you want, you choose," Sitbon said in table chat and added soon after "I don't bluff you."

After a while, Sitbon asked the other players if it was long enough to call the clock or not, but resisted in requesting it. "I don't want you to make a mistake, take your time," the Frenchman said. Another player called the clock a minute later and Talan folded, he picked one of the cards as promised by Sitbon and the was exposed.

"Eight nine, that's good right?" while dragging in a big pot.

Player	Chips	Progress
Julien Sitbon	53,000	32,000
Soran Talan	31,000	31,000

Tags: Domien Fierens Julien Sitbon Soran Talan

02-23-2018 12:42 UTC

Not a Purdy Day

Christian Zetzsche

Level 2 : 100/200, 25 ante

Well that wasn't purrrdy for Mark "Valkia" Purdy, as the eSports Star has been sent to the rail. having lost most of his stack previously already, Purdy was then involved in a three-way pot and called all in for just 1,325 on the turn. The small blind had checked and Tommy Skarbo in the big blind bet 4,500 into a pot of around 13,000.

After the call of Purdy, the small blind folded and the cards were flipped over.

Mark Purdy:
Tommy Skarbo: