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).

Edilberto Gopez of the Philippines opens from UTG for 15,000 and right beside him in the +1 position, Canada’s Robert Williams makes the call. Everyone else folds.

The flop comes 8♥ 2♦ 9♠ as Gopez checks. Williams bets 15,000 and gets check-raised to 40,000. The Canadian re-raises all-in for his remaining stack of 76,000 and Gopez makes the snap call.

Williams unveils T♠ T♣ for an over-pair to the board while the Filipino tables K♠ K♥ for a bigger over-pair.

The last two community cards are the Q♥ and the 8♦ as Williams is busted and the money bubble looms.

Yang Chih Hun of Taiwan opens from the +1 position for 9,000 and gets called by the SB while Filipino Edliberto Gopez joins from the BB.

The flop is 9♣ 3♦ 4♦ as the blinds check. Tang continues for 11,000 as the SB but Gopez check-raises to 33,000. Yang 3-bets to 100,000, effectively asking for all of the Filipino’s chips. Gopez tanks and subsequently folds, leaving him with less than one hundred thousand in chips.

Park Sangsub continues to bleed chips as this time it is Edliberto Gopez’s turn to raise from the CO to 7,000 and the Korean makes a BB defense.

The flop comes 7♥ 3♦ 8♣ as Park donks in for 17,500. Gopez’s response is to shobe his remaining stack of 58,000 into the pot. Park makes the call.

Gopez flips over Q♣ 8♠ for top pair on the flop while Park shows A♥ 7♠ for second pair on the flop.

The last two community cards are the K♣ and the 2♣ to give Gopez a double up and have Park slowly slip down from the big stack conversation.