Main Event (18,500 PHP)

The smoke is barely clearing from the battles on the felt for Main Event Day 1A in the Manila Super Series 22 at Pokerstars Live here in Okada Manila but in the end, 34 players from 224 total entries move on to Day 2 with the chip lead changing favors multiple times before the money bubble was eventually burst.

It looked to be a cruise for the Netherland’s Germ de Haas as he was the first to breach the 200,000 chip mark in the early levels but it slowly became apparent that Park Sangsub was out to control the proceedings as he gained the chip lead in the midway mark. Then came Ryuki Shirase of Japan following the outmuscling he did of China’s Li Zhouji. Edgar Asehan of the Philippines also momentarily sat atop the leaderboard but then de Haas began regaining traction and officially stamped his name on the chip leader position after busting Japan’s Takahashi Miyamoto with quads.

But the tournament was still waiting for the money bubble to be burst and Filipino Buds Ampatuan did just that when he flopped a set against Motoya Sato of Japan and it ensured that the 34 left would all be ITM.

De Haas amassed 715,000 in chips and is followed distantly by Shirase with 589,000. Third place is shared by Taiwan’s Yang Chih Chun and Edliberto Gopez of the Philippines with identical stacks of 369,000.

Day 1B commences tomorrow (June 13) still at 12:00NN (UCT+8).

Buds Ampatuan of the Philippines opens from the +1 position for 12,000 as it folds to the CO where Japan’s Motoya Sato declares he is all-in for his last 46,000. It folds back to the Fiipino who makes the call.

Sato shows 7♠ 7♣ while Ampatuan tables A♥ T♠ .

The flop comes T♣ J♣ 8♠ as even if Ampatuan outflops Sato, the Japanese player still has outs. The turn is the T♦ and no miracle happens on the river as the 5♥ seals the deal and the 34 players remaining all advance to day 2.

Yan Hongan raises it from UTG to 6,000 and gets the SB in the Philippines’ Buds Ampatuan and the BB in Akhil Narain Bahadur of India to give him action.

The flop comes T♠ 2♠ 9♠ as Ampatuan checks. Bahadur then puts his last 33,500 into the middle of the table as Yan makes the call. Ampatuan then raises all-in for his remaining 116,000. Yan still makes the call.

The Indian shows Q♠ T♥ for top pair on the flop while Ampatuan turns over K♠ 3♠ for a flush on the flop. Yan has A♠ Q♣ for the nut flush draw.

The turn is the 2♥ while the river is the 4♣ to have the Filipino scoop the pot and install him as among the favorites to advance to Day 2 with his monster stack. Yan’s stack drops to beyond the danger zone.