Tony G and Kisacikoglu pick up Triton titles at partypoker LIVE MILLIONS Europe

Just two weeks after the excitement of London, the Triton train has rolled into a new station. King’s Resort in the Czech Republic is currently hosting the partypoker LIVE MILLIONS Europe, and Triton has been an integral part of that over the last few days, bringing two events to the live schedule. Many of the same protagonists we saw in London have made the trip over, with Phil Ivey also getting in on the action. Paul Phua only final tabled one of the two events here, but that was far from being the only point of interest in Rozvadov as two new Triton champions were crowned.

€100,000 Triton Super High Roller – Winner: Orpen Kisacikoglu

The second Triton event on the schedule in Rozvadov was the €100,000 (US$111,565) Super High Roller. There were 21 unique entrants, with re-entries bringing the tally of buy ins up to 32. This helped generate a prize pool of €3,040,000 (US$3,391,561). Igor Kurganov managed to bag up a chipleading stack of 743,000 by the end of the first day, with 18 runners surviving to see day 2.

The second day brought with it some sizeable turnarounds in fortune, with some of the more comfortable stacks in the room not making the money. The final 9 players did include Paul Phua, and his elimination brought about the official final table of 8, with only 6 players set to get paid. Michael Addamo then busted in 8^th before former chipleader Kurganov followed his pure bubble in the Triton £1,000,000 event with a pure bubble in this one too.

The remaining players were officially in the money, but this did not prove the catalyst for quick bustouts, as it took some time to play down to the final three players. The bustout of Triton London Main Event winner Wai Kin Yong in 4^th got the action three-handed, and after some further pots were traded, Ben Heath fell in 3^rd place after losing a flip. The beneficiary of that encounter, Orpen Kisacikoglu carried a slight chiplead into heads up play against Vladimir Troyanovskiy.

After briefly relinquishing the chiplead, Kisacikoglu was able to barge his way back in front before the critical hand played out. Both players flopped top pair, the chips flew in, and Kisacikoglu’s marginally better kicker proved to be enough.

The final payouts are as follows:

1^st – Orpen Kisacikoglu (Turkey) – €1,040,000 (US$1,166,000)
2^nd – Vladimir Troyanovksiy (Russia) – €710,000
3^rd – Ben Heath (United Kingdom) – €455,000
4^th – Wai Kin Yong (Malaysia) – €349,000
5^th – Cary Katz (United States) – €273,000
6^th – Kristen Bicknell (Canada) – €213,000

€25,300 Triton Short Deck – Winner: Antanas Guoga

This €25,300 (US$28,226) event brought Triton back into town with a bang, providing the watching world with another taste of the fascinating game of Short Deck. Re-entries were available, meaning that some of the 16 runners fired multiple bullets, a fact which helped to bolster the prize pool to a final sum of €641,250 (US$715,407) through 27 total entries.

Among those firing multiple times was Phil Ivey, although he failed to turn his bullets into bullion, eventually hitting the rail in 10^th place. By the time play had finished at the end of the first day, just 7 remained, with Paul Phua notching yet another final table, albeit as a short stack.

When play resumed the following day, Antanas Guoga, better known as Tony G held the chiplead with 2,305,000 chips. The notoriously loud and opinionated Lithuanian was followed closely by owner of King’s Resort, Leon Tsoukernik with 1,700,000 and China’s Yake Wu on a near equal stack. The early exchanges saw Paul Phua make his exit, courtesy of Tony G, followed by recent Triton London side event winner Liang Yu. He was followed a few minutes later by Choon Song Tiow, bringing the field down to four after just over half an hour of play.

Tony G quickly extended his lead to double that of his nearest rival and continued to boss the table through the following levels, accumulating over half the chips in play. Katz then began an irreversible backwards slide in the counts, before shoving his last 12 antes in to bust in 4^th, before Tsoukernik followed suit to exit in 3^rd. Tony G and China‘s Yake Wu began with a chip disparity of 3 to 1 in the Lithuanian’s favour and that situation never truly swung back towards Wu. He did hit some fortunate cards to keep himself alive more than once when all-in, but ultimately, the day belonged to Guoga.

Winner, winner, chicken dinner!I’m @tritonpoker @partypokerlive champion! I have the big heart and the big spray! #MILLIONSEurope pic.twitter.com/NvunboijTf

— Tony G (@TonyGuoga) August 14, 2019

Here are the final payouts:

1^st – Tony G (Lithuania) – €237,250 (US$264,687)
2^nd – Yake Wu (China) – €163,000
3^rd – Leon Tsoukernik (Czech Republic) – €104,500
4^th – Cary Katz (United States) – €75,500
5^th – Choon Tong Siow (Malaysia) – €61,000

Article by Craig Bradshaw