The World Poker Tour stop at the Kings Casino in Prague, the Czech Republic, is headed into its home stretch after Day Three action yesterday. Sitting atop the leaderboard as the next to last day is set to begin this morning in Europe is Tony Chang, but a host of players are looking to take him down.
Action began yesterday at the Corinthia Hotel with Marco Lang sitting in the pole position and facing Elio Fox, Dermot Blain, Kevin MacPhee, Jason Mercier and many others among the 78 players remaining. With only 72 of yesterday’s survivors getting paid, the atmosphere was tense around the Kings Casino as those who would have nothing but a story from the WPT Prague were determined.
Fox would actually be the man that would help everybody out by popping the money bubble. Dimitry Grishin would push his K-J into Fox, who just happened to wake up with Big Slick for help in his decision. Fox, naturally, made the call and, although a King came on the flop, an Ace came on the turn to lock up the hand for Fox, push him to the 700K chip mark and eliminate Grishin in 73rd place ($0).
With the remainder of the field now guaranteed a $6515 payday, the bust outs came rapidly. Sergey Vasilyev took care of two of those knockouts when, holding pocket Kings, he was able to get Mario Nakowitz (pocket Queens) and Eddie Tasbas (A-K) to commit their chips to the center of the felt. Once no surprises came on the board, he held all of those chips to push his stack up to 530K.
MacPhee also made his way to the 500K mark in eliminating Amatos Gomila in a unique hand. All in pre-flop, MacPhee’s pocket Kings were in a dominant position over Gomila’s pocket Jacks, but the board proved to be interesting. The 10-9-8 flop brought open ended possibilities for Gomila and, once a Queen landed on the turn, he took the lead. Having to only fade the two outs he thought he would need to win (the remaining Jacks), Gomila was dismayed to see one of those come on the river, putting a straight on the board and bringing MacPhee’s Kings into play to make a higher straight. With that, Gomila was gone from the tournament and MacPhee stacked the chips.
Fox continued to build on his chip stack, getting a bit lucky against Alexander Gerlach. After an opening bet from Daniel Ospina and a call from Lars Bonding, Gerlach popped his chips to the center. Fox isolated with an all-in “over the top” move for his stack and, once Ospina and Bonding decided not to play, unveiled his pocket tens, which were dominated by Gerlach’s pocket Queens. A ten in the window of the flop changed everything, putting Fox in the lead, and once the turn and river failed to bring a Queen, Fox surged to the lead with over 900K in chips and Gerlach was eliminated.
The former World Series of Poker Europe Main Event champion maintained that lead through much of the remainder of the evening and he never took his foot off the gas. He eliminated Day Two chip leader Marco Lang when his pocket Jacks stood firm against Lang’s A-Q, but a late night elimination would see a player surpass Fox for the chip lead.
Battling against Lucille Cailly, Chang had meticulously built a stack that had the Frenchwoman covered. Chang (who has also raised the ire of his opponents with his “slow” style of play on the felt), three bet a raise from the button, only to see Cailly move her stack of 165K to the center from the big blind. After the initial raiser got out of the way, Chang made an immediate call (in a departure from his style) and tabled pocket Queens against Cailly’s A-Q. There was no help coming for Cailly and, as the board ran out 10-7-3-Q-9, she headed to the rail and Chang headed to the top of the tournament ladder.
With action on Day Four ready to start, here’s how the Top Ten will line up of the 22 remaining players:
1. Tony Chang, 2.173 million
2. Bodo Sbrzesny, 1.703 million
3. Konstantin Danilov, 1.377 million
4. Michael Gagliano, 1.266 million
5. Elio Fox, 1.186 million
6. Marcin Wydrowski, 1.118 million
7. Yann Dion, 877,000
8. Frank Stumpf, 772,000
9. Sergey Vasilyev, 768,000
10. Alexander Lahkov, 720,000
MacPhee just missed the Top Ten with his 697K in chips, while Bonding (531K) and Blain (480K) remain in contention.
The WPT Prague will play down to the final table today, with the conclusion of the event coming on Sunday. At stake for the remaining players is the latest championship on the WPT and the privilege of getting their name on the WPT Champions’ Cup, a seat at the Season XI WPT Championship come next May and, perhaps most importantly, a $423,957 payday.
