APPT Manila Championship

Nearing the end of his rope, Filipino pro John Tech goes all-in when the action gets folded to him on the D for 97,000. Malaysian poker icon Michael Soyza calls him from the BB.

The ensuing runout had miracle written all over it as Tech stays afloat in the competition.

Ngo Hieu of Vietnam open shoves for 96,000 on the HJ and Filipino pro John Tech makes the quick call from the CO.

Ngo tables 2♣ 2♦ while Tech brandishes A♠ A♦ .

The flop kept the Filipino ahead: 5♣ K♠ 3♠ but the turn card is the 2♥ to give the Vietnamese player a set. Needing one of the two remaining aces in the deck, Tech sees the T♥ on the river and also sees most of his chips going to Ngo.

Tech is left with a stack of less than six BBs after the bad beat.

After the storm in the city subsided, so did the action settle down at Okada Manila where Flight B of the APPT Manila Championship concluded for the day. 194 entries made the buy-in of PHP 165,000 (~US$ 2,850) to compete for their share of the PHP 55,000,000 (~US$ 960,850) guaranteed prize pool. 80 players were still on their seats to bag their chips at the end of 11 levels and nearly 12 hours of poker. Those 80 players will be back tomorrow to compete again in the Day 2 leg and will be joined by the 59 players who advanced from Flight A.

Among the 80 survivors of Flight B, it was Kim Youngkim of South Korea who bagged the largest stack with 452,500 chips. Moses Saquing of the Philippines was at a distant second with a very healthy 295,000. Rounding up the top three chip leaders is American John Joseph Panish who bagged 277,500 to carry onto Day 2.

Date/s: October 23 to 27, 2024

Buy in: PHP 165,000 (~US$ 2,850)

Guarantee: PHP 55,000,000 (~US$ 960,850)

Entries: 194

Starting Stack: 50,000

Average Stack: 116,867

Blinds: 1,000/1,500 Ante 1,500

Remaining players: 80

Meanwhile here are the top 10 chip counts