With the shocking fall of Gus Hansen, we have reached our final table of eight, signaling the end of play for Day 3.
Cards went into the air some 15 hours ago with 48 players vying for a seat at the final table. Among those who failed to make it all the way to the end were Scotty Nguyen, Arnaud Mattern, young guns Noah Schwartz and Patryk Hildebranski, both Robert and Michael Mizrachi, as well as start-of-the day chip leader Patrice Sitbon, who ran into big troubles early on.
It's anybody's game tomorrow, and whoever it is that does manage to outwit and outlast the rest of his table mates will take home a cool €1,000,000 -- or $1,426,645 USD.
The chip counts heading into the final table are as follows:
Claudio Renaldi: 749,000
Michael Abecassis: 375,000
Jean Philippe Rohr: 750,000
Philippe Narboni: 1,456,000
Antonin Tesseire: 541,000
Stephane Bazin: 2,387,000
[Removed:133]: 1,102,000
Alain Roy: 2,225,000
Play is scheduled to begin a bit later at 4:00pm local time tomorrow, and we hope you'll join us then as we crown the first ever Partouche Poker Tour Grand Champion!
Left with only 181,000, Gus Hansen committed them all to the middle when it was folded around to him in the small blind. He received a quick call from Alain Roy in the big blind with . Hansen had the same ill-fated .
The board came .
The queen kicker played eliminating the Dane just shy of the final table of eight players. He definitely will not sleep well tonight.
Stephane Bazin opened a big can of worms when he raised to 120,000 from the cutoff seat. A couple seats down the line, Gus Hansen was occupying the big blind, and he reraised to 344,000. Without too much hesitation, Bazin moved all in for a whopping 1,172,000.
The move put Gus deep into the tank. He had the dealer pull in the 344,000 so that he could eye up the remaining call before counting and re-counting his stack several times. After he had all the information he needed, he began a ten-minute monologue as he debated his play.
"I really don't have a lot... but I don't think you have a lot either."
"If I do it, it'd be pretty crazy. Pretty crazy."
"I'm not gonna sleep very good tonight either way."
"Crazy. This would be crazy."
"I'm gonna have some water while I think," he said, bending down to take a sip from his bottle.
"I have a piece of sh*t... but I think you have a piece of sh*t, too."
Finally, after ten or fifteen minutes, he announced, "Okay, I call," as he slid nearly all of his chips into the middle of the table. Bazin seemed eager to show down his hand, as he fumbled to flip over . Gus furrowed his eyebrows, turning over the ... followed a moment later by the , putting him in quite bad shape and drawing a massive reaction from the spectators.
With nearly 2.4 million chips heaped in the middle of the table, the biggest pot of the tournament was up for grabs. With no further betting action, the dealer spread the flop: .
Nothing like a little drama at 7:00am. Bazin was still ahead, but Hansen picked up nine more outs to work with.
Turn: . No help to Hansen.
With one more card to come, Gus needed to find a six or a heart to knock out his opponent.
River: .
In a shocking plot switch, Gus Hansen moves all but 181,000 of his chips over to Stephane Bazin, who has claimed a massive chip lead, sitting with a staggering 2,387,000.
The tournament staff has just announced that they're going to call it quits for the day either at the end of this level or when the 9th place finisher is decided -- whichever comes first.
In the event that the clock runs out on the level, tomorrow's final table play will begin with nine players rather than eight.
[Removed:133] just reaped the benefits of a failed resteal play made by Claudio Rinaldi and has doubled up to almost one million in chips.
The hand saw action fold around to Brice in the cutoff who made it 105,000 to go. The button and small blind players folded and when it was Claudio's turn to act, he put Brice all in. Brice made a quick call and tabled a pocket pair of jacks, ecstatic to see the hand he was up against -- .
The flop hit Brice hard, giving him a set, but it also gave Claudio a flush draw and a backdoor straight draw.
The drama didn't last very long, however, as the fell on the turn, giving Brice an unbeatable full boat.
Gus Hansen makes a raise to 92,000 before [Removed:133] reraises all in for 251,000. "I don't like my hand but I think I'm going to call," says Hansen.
Call he does with and he's behind to Cournut's .
The board comes .
Cournut hangs in there with a timely and needed double-up putting him up to 574,000.
Jean Philippe Rohr raises to 120,000 from under the gun. It's folded around to Michael Abecassis in the big blind who moves all in for about 620,000. Rohr tanks for a while and then folds, showing .
Short-stacked Antonin Tesseire has just doubled through his next door neighbor, [Removed:133].
Cournut opened the pot with a raise to 80,000 and when the action fell on Tesseire, he moved all in for a total of 236,000. Cournut made the call and turned over an unimpressive ; Tesseire tabled .
The board was all Tesseire, who successfully doubled through to ~490,000 in chips.
It's folded around to Jean Philippe Rohr in the highjack who moves all in for 349,000, a little bit more that eleven big blinds. Gus Hansen folds on the button before Alain Roy moves all in behind him, causing all others to fold.
Rohr shows us but he's behind to Roy's .
All the way to the river we go . The first card out is enough to double-up one of our short stacks and keep this going for a little longer.