After coming up short at his three previous final tables during the 2013 World Series of Poker, the United Kingdom’s Matthew Ashton finally broke through in a big way, taking down the $50,000 Poker Players’ Championship early Friday morning.
Event #55 on the 2013 WSOP schedule brought back the survivors from the previous five days of competition that had whittled the field from 132 to the final eight. As he had done on Day Three, Don Nguyen was in the lead again when the chips were bagged on Wednesday after Day Four. Ashton was a ways back behind Nguyen (5.068 million to 2.996 million) in second place, while George Danzer (having a nice 2013 WSOP himself), David Benyamine, Minh Ly, Jonathan Duhamel, John “World” Hennigan and Mike Wattel filled out the remainder of the seats.
After a few hands of jousting, Duhamel decided to try to move up the leaderboard in Pot Limit Omaha, pushing out a bet that was called by both Danzer and Ashton. On a 6-J-10 flop, both Ashton and Duhamel checked their option and, after a 130K bet from Danzer, Ashton dropped his cards in the muck. Duhamel potted Danzer for 600K, but Danzer fired back with a three bet and Duhamel moved the remainder of his stack in to call. Danzer was in great shape, his J-6-5-2 flopping two pair, and Duhamel’s K-K-Q-2 was in trouble but had draws. A Queen on the turn kept Danzer in the lead and, once an innocent four hit the river, Duhamel was out in eighth place as Danzer took over second place behind Nguyen.
Wattel, who had come to the final table as the only player not holding a seven figure stack, was able to push it up over the million mark but not much further. In No Limit Hold’em, Wattel found a spot to make a stand against Nguyen, pushing all in, and Nguyen made the call. Wattel’s A-J was crushed by Nguyen’s A-Q and, after a Queen on the flop, fell a little further back. The flop also had a ten, however, which opened up draws for Wattel to the Broadway straight, but a deuce on the turn and a nine on the river weren’t what he was looking for as he exited “The Mothership” in seventh place with his largest ever WSOP cash.
As the action shifted to Seven Card Stud, Benyamine made his presence known. In a three way fight with Danzer and Ly, Danzer held a ten high flush but was eclipsed by Benyamine’s Ace high flush. After looking at Seventh Street, Ly could only muster two pair and, with all his chips in the center, departed the tournament in sixth place as Benyamine popped into the second place slot.
Ashton would make his claim for the Poker Players’ Championship in winning two of four hands of Omaha Hi/Lo, sliding into second as Benyamine assumed the lead as Nguyen began to falter a bit. A resilient Nguyen, however, would retake the lead in Pot Limit Omaha against Danzer, his K-J-10-8 striking on the river of an 8-8-3-4-J board against Danzer’s A-K-9-8 to steal the pot and eliminate Danzer in fifth place. With four players left, Nguyen was back on top, with Benyamine, Ashton and a quiet Hennigan still alive for the championship as the dinner break arrived.
Things would get bad for Benyamine following the halftime break. Nguyen would river a full house against him (Benyamine had made a wise decision in not calling off his remaining chips) in Pot Limit Omaha to drop to only 1.38 million and would eventually fall to Nguyen in Seven Card Stud when he was drawing dead by Sixth Street to finish in fourth place. As the final three players readied themselves, it still looked like Nguyen was the man to beat.
While he was quiet early, Hennigan began to assert himself during three handed play. He would join up with Ashton to take two Razz hands from Nguyen to push Nguyen into third place while Hennigan took the lead and Ashton slipped into second. After Ashton took down a Pot Limit Omaha battle against Nguyen, he suddenly jumped into the lead over Hennigan and broke the eleven million chip mark in taking another PLO contest over “Johnny World.” Hennigan would eventually be ground down by his opponents and fall at the hands of Ashton in PLO to finish in third place.
It looked to be a short heads up fight, with Ashton holding 17.3 million in chips to Nguyen’s 2.5 million, and it was. After only two hands of Limit Hold’em, Nguyen’s chips were all in on the river of a 10-7-3-9-Q board. He turned up a 10-6 for a mediocre pair of tens, while Ashton displayed his K-10 proudly for the same mediocre pair of tens but with a better kicker. With that hand, Ashton achieved a goal that had eluded him at this year’s WSOP – the gold bracelet – and on arguably the best stage that poker can present in the Poker Players’ Championship.
1. Matthew Ashton (Liverpool, the United Kingdom), $1,774,089
2. Don Nguyen (Chino Hills, CA), $1,096,254
3. John Hennigan (Las Vegas, NV), $686,568
4. David Benyamine (Henderson, NV), $497,122
5. George Danzer (Munich, Germany), $388,523
6. Minh Ly (Temple City, CA), $309,830
7. Mike Wattel (Chandler, AZ), $251,602
8. Jonathan Duhamel (Boucherville, Quebec, Canada), $207,630
Ashton now joins such luminous company as two time PPC winner Michael Mizrachi, Freddy Deeb, Scotty Nguyen, David Bach, Brian Rast and the late Chip Reese (the inaugural winner of the tournament) on the Chip Reese Memorial Trophy, a befitting finale to what was a hard fought tournament.
