Last year, APPT Macau Main Event attracted 494 players and although organisers hoped to surpass last years figure, they will be reasonably happy with the 493 that participated this time around. Players fought for a prize pool of HK$10,998,830 ($1,418,599) and 59 of them finished in the money.
Final Table
The final table this year saw four of the Chinese players fall in 7th, 6th ,5th and 4th , leaving only Weijie Ye of China, Yat Wai Cheng of Hong Kong, and Florencio Campomanes of The Philippines. With live winnings of $133,673 before today, he is no stranger to Asian poker tours, having had final tables on the APT and APPT before, along with deep runs and a side event victory at the Macau Poker Cup. He eventually fell in 3rd place at this final table, and although he would have been hoping for a huge breakthrough victory here, his live winnings have almost doubled as a result of his 3rd place.
Weije Ye who describe himseflf as a businessman learned poker 3 years ago. Despite his little experience, he fought valiantly heads up, but it was Yat Wai Cheng from Hong Kong who managed to earn the victory and 1st prize of HK$2,525,000 ($325,659). The winner is playing poker for 6 years mostly live Cash Games up $100-$200. His best score before tonight was a fourth place finisih in the 2013 Macau ACOP Hk$ 100k event for almost $200K ($191,504).
"Tony" Cheng is the new APPT Macau Main Event Champion (Photo PokerStars)
Chinese players on the rise
It has to be noted that five Chinese players made it to the final table, which was an interesting contrast to the one Chinese player (the eventual winner) who reached the same stage last year. When you add this fact to the Asian Player of the Year leaderboard which currently features Chinese players in it's top 4 places, you could say that there is a trend taking place. There seems to be a wave of good Chinese players coming through, which was very evident in this years APPT Macau Main Event
The final table standings are as follows:
1st Yat Wai Cheng HK$2,525,000
2nd Weijie Ye HK$1,526,000
3rd Florencio Campomanes HK$926,000
4th Zhenru Xie HK$698,000
5th Chun Liang Cuo HK$490,000
6th Fan Zhao HK$381,000
7th Weiyi Zhang HK$310,280
Yat Wai Cheng in interview with Pokernews