The World Poker Tour has an up and down schedule. Parts of it are slow, with wide gaps between events. Those would be the down parts of the schedule (see how this works?). Right now, we’re in an upswing, with events coming back-to-back and overlapping. While the World Poker Tour (WPT) Montreal Main Event was in its opening stages this weekend, the WPT UK Main Event finished up, as 21-year old Lithuanian Matas Cimbolas was crowned champion.
It was one heck of an uphill battle for Cimbolas during the heads-up match against Ben Warrington. Cimbolas began by facing a more than a 2-to-1 chip deficit, trailing 3,150,000 to 7,475,000. Early on in the battle, Cimbolas fell into a much deeper hole, a hole which appeared nearly impossible to escape. He and Warrington traded the first few pots, but several hands in, Cimbolas got sucked into a big pot before losing a checked river. He gave up around 1,500,000 chips from pre-flop through the turn, ending the hand with only 1,500,000 million, compared to 9,100,000 for Warrington, about a 6-to-1 chip differential.
It took a while, but Cimbolas gradually came back (I mean, since you already know he won, it is obvious that he came back, but the point I was trying to make is that it took some time). A couple levels after seemingly being crippled, he doubled-up to bring the deficit to a much more manageable 2-to-1. Immediately after that, he grabbed another pot, growing his stack to 4,100,000. And then, a short time later, he doubled-up once more, this time taking the chip lead, 6,500,000 to 4,100,000.
Warrington came back quickly to almost even the score, but after a break, Cimbolas stretched the lead out again, getting all the way up to 7,500,000 chips. A few minutes later, it was all over. Warrington moved all-in pre-lop for about 2,900,000 with 9♠-7♠ and Cimbolas made the call with K♦-J♥. Two live, suited cards meant that the situation was about as good as Warrington could’ve have hoped for in this spot. The flop was 5♣-3♠-2♣, deceptively bad for Warrington. It was all low, but too low to help him, and it was all black, but only one of those cards was a spade. The turn was the 3♣, leaving Warrington searching for six outs. None of those appeared; the river was the A♦, giving Cimbolas the pot, all the chips in the tournament, and his first World Poker Tour title. Not too shabby for his first ever live tournament win.
2014 World Poker Tour UK Main Event – Final Table Standings
1. Matas Cimbolas – £200,000
2. Ben Warrington – £140,000
3. Tamer Kamel – £92,000
4. Antoine Saout – £67,000
5. Phillip Mighall – £48,000
6. Patrick Leonard – £39,500