2012 PokerStars.net ANZPT Season 5 Auckland Day 1c: Xia Takes Charge
The third and final flight of the PokerStars.net Australia New Zealand Poker Tour Auckland Main Event is in the books. Day 1c was the last day for players to buy-in and give themselves every chance to make it through to Day 2, so it wasn’t any surprise when 86-runners turned up to bring the tournament total to 207 entries. The field created a prize pool of NZ$414,000 and the all-important payouts can be found here.
As expected, several big names took their seats for the final starting day, including 2011 Aussie Millions champion David Gorr, Danny “Brotha D” Leaoasavaii, Team PokerStars Pro Bryan Huang and World Series of Poker bracelet winner Simon Watt.
During the day, Watt was involved in a massive pot that saw both him and Stephen McKay commit all their chips preflop, creating a pot over 100,000 in chips. Watt was in great shape when he tabled his A♣A♠ after seeing McKay had the K♦K♠. All was going to plan until the river fell the K♥, though, and Watt saw his day end prematurely.
As the day rolled on, it was some fairly unknown players who made their presence felt and made late runs to obtain the chip lead. Xiao Dong Xia left it till the last 20 minutes of the day to win two of the biggest pots, and subsequently lead all competitors going into Day 2.
The biggest hand came when he and McKay met with a few minutes of the day to go. On a flop showing K♥5♦6♥, Xia checked-raised and was called, before the turn fell the A♥. Xia then check-called the turn for 20,000. When the river repeated the A♦, Xia checked, and McKay threw out a bet of 40,000. He was eventually called by Xia. McKay was shocked when he tabled his 6♠6♦ for a full-house, but was beaten by the K♦K♠ of Xia. The other players at the table were just as shocked at what happened, as Xia started stacking up his mountain of chips.
Xia’s 180,600-chip stack ended up towering over those of Monica Eastick (137,000), Patrick Lui (105,700) and Pravin Haryi (88,000) who finished near the top of the leader board for the day. With that, Xia will head into Day 2 as the overall chip leader. The top 10 chip counts from Day 1c can be found below.
Day 1c Top 10 Chip Counts
| Place | Player | Chips |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Xiao Dong Xia | 180,600 |
| 2 | Monica Eastick | 137,000 |
| 3 | Patrick Lui | 105,700 |
| 4 | Pravin Harji | 88,000 |
| 5 | Emile Gissaud | 80,200 |
| 6 | Kani Edwards | 72,700 |
| 7 | Jamie Mulligan | 70,200 |
| 8 | Keith Walker | 70,200 |
| 9 | Mike Stecker | 65,100 |
| 10 | Dennis Shikhu | 62,500 |
Day 2 will commence at 1230 NZDT Saturday (1530 PDT Friday) with 76 players returning, all looking to make a deep run in hopes of taking home the NZ$107,640 first prize and title of ANZPT Auckland. The top 24 places will be paid out, and you can find all of the live updates over on the PokerNews Live Reporting pages.
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