Teun Mulder Leads Final Nine in 2020 WCOOP-72-H: $5,200 Main Event
In fewer than six and a half hours on Day 3, the nine-handed final table in WCOOP-72-H: $5,200 NLHE [8-Max, Main Event] has been set and eight different countries will be represented on the final table of the pinnacle event of the PokerStars World Championship of Online Poker (WCOOP) 2020.
Leading the finalists and in prime position to claim the lion's share of the $10,000,000 prize pool is Dutchman Teun "tinnoemulder" Mulder, who entered the penultimate day fourth in chips and finished it with 134,881,209 in chips.
Also sporting the Dutch flag in the PokerStars client is Portuguese poker pro Andre "PTFisherman23" Marques, who accumulated 119,709,612 thus far, and the 2013 EPT London Main Event champion Robin "robinho" Ylitalo sits in third place with 111,085,257.
There is already a big gap to Pot-Limit Omaha aficionado Andriy "Andre_Hansen" Lyubovetskiy (41,580,949, who is followed by Tonio "prrrak4783" Röder (30,938,957), Michael "munchenHB" Telker (23,201,757) and Denys "SantaZzz" Chufarin (15,899,972). The two shortest stacks "77atlant77" (9,117,779) and Cecilia "princes chu" Cafaro (7,834,508) have 11 and 10 big blinds at their disposal.
The Final Table of the 2020 WCOOP-72-H: $5,200 Main Event
| Position | Player | Country | Chip Count | Big Blinds |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Teun "tinnoemulder" Mulder | Netherlands | 134,881,209 | 169 |
| 2 | Andre "PTFisherman23" Marques | Portugal | 119,709,612 | 150 |
| 3 | Robin "robinho" Ylitalo | Sweden | 111,085,257 | 139 |
| 4 | Andriy "Andre_Hansen" Lyubovetskiy | Ukraine | 41,580,949 | 52 |
| 5 | Tonio "prrrak4783" Röder | Germany | 30,938,957 | 39 |
| 6 | Michael "munchenHB" Telker | United States | 23,201,757 | 29 |
| 7 | Denys "SantaZzz" Chufarin | Ukraine | 15,899,972 | 20 |
| 8 | 77atlant77 | Russia | 9,117,779 | 11 |
| 9 | Cecilia "princes chu" Cafaro | Uruguay | 7,834,508 | 10 |
The Action of the Day
The early stages of the penultimate tournament day saw a steady pace of eliminations and among those to depart were Dzmitry "Colisea" Urbanovich, Victor "VzB_Poker" Begara, Michel "FreeLancerZZ" Dattani, Christian "WATnlos" Rudolph, and Rodrigo "seijistar" Seiji who all departed outside of the top 50.
Online poker MTT legend Simon "C. Darwin2" Mattsson made it one step further and earned a pay jump to $33,402, which also applied for Julien "Stroposoz" Achard-Stropoli, Jasper "AppelKruimel" Wetemans, Sergio "zcedrick" Aido, and Gary "GaryT20" Thompson. The elimination of Thompson vaulted Andre "PTFisherman23" Marques into a big stack when he turned a set of sevens and Thompson called it off with two pair on the river.
Down to the final three tables, the 2014 World Series of Poker Main Event champion Martin "M.nosbocaJ" Jacobson lost a flip with jacks to king-queen and was one of several notables that bowed out in quick succession including Josip "Jozinho6" Simunic, Viktor "papan9_p$" Ustimov, and Daniel "Razer2311" Rezaei.
Marques; Mulder and Ylitalo Dominate the Late Stages
Ustimov was second in chips just half an hour before he was sent to the rail in 20th place. The Russian lost several bigger pots in a matter of minutes and ultimately jammed with kings into the flopped set of sevens of Marques, who subsequently became the first player to jump above 100 million in chips. One major setback took place when Marques made a gutsy move with bottom pair and Teun "tinnoemulder" Mulder called with second pair.
Swedish online MTT grinder "Sasuke234" missed the final two tables and Pablo "elmelogno4" Melogno was the first to depart from there on out. Robin "robinho" Ylitalo jumped into a big stack when his kings held against the ace-king suited of "Spotzilla666" and after that, it was a survival challenge for all short and medium stacks with a trio atop the leaderboard.
Renan "Internett93o" Bruschi scored a lucky double with queen-jack suited versus jacks to then lose aces to queens and fellow countryman Bernardo "bedias" Dias departed next. Marques regained his lead by knocking out "WhatIfGod" and Daniel "dougiedan678" McAulay to bring the field to the final table bubble. A private duel with Mulder saw the Dutchman on top most of the time but Marques ended the night on a high when he cracked the kings of "shane261966" with ace-nine suited.
The Remaining Payouts
| Place | Payout (in USD) |
|---|---|
| 1 | $1,499,942 |
| 2 | $1,069,210 |
| 3 | $762,169 |
| 4 | $543,301 |
| 5 | $387,284 |
| 6 | $276,069 |
| 7 | $196,792 |
| 8 | $140,280 |
| 9 | $99,997 |
The remaining nine players will return the following day as of 1.05 p.m. Eastern Standard Time (EST) in order to play down to a champion. Most of level 42 featuring blinds of 400,000/800,000 and a running ante of 100,000 is to be played and the final table will be broadcasted on the PokerStars Twitch channel with cards-up coverage and commentary on a delay of at least 20 minutes.