Day Two of the World Poker Tour stop at the Casino Barcelona in Spain is in the books with a chance at history looming if Sunday’s action continues its course.
148 players came back on Sunday, with local player Sergio Fernandez holding a 37,000 chip lead over Ognjen Sekularac. Day 1A chip leader Manuel Bevand was lurking in third place, with Kevin Vandersmissen, Paul Berende and Paul Testud sitting in the Top Ten. These men were joined by notables such as Toby Lewis, Steve O’Dwyer, Dan Cates and Matt Salsberg who, while not high up on the leaderboard, still had enough ammunition to go to battle.
Lewis would make an early move on the day to improve his stack, doubling up with his pocket eights against Alexandre Reard’s A-K to push his stack over the 80K mark. Despite starting with much the same stack, Cates would go the opposite way and was an early casualty of the day. Cates would soon have company on the rail in the forms of Faraz Jaka, Gaelle Baumann and Adam Levy.
The list of notable players who would make the march out of the Casino Barcelona in the early hours only would get larger. Davidi Kitai, Salsberg and Kevin MacPhee would be out before the dinner break, but it was at this time that the defending champion of the tournament, Lukas Berglund, began to make some moves. He would cut some chips from the rather large stack of Tahiri Hassani to push his way over the 130K mark and seemed to always be adding to his stack as the day wore on.
Fernandez and Sekularac also would clash in a hand that would see the two switch positions. After Raul Paez opened the betting, Sekularac fired off a three bet and Fernandez four-bet out of the big blind. That was enough for Paez, but Sekularac came along to see a Q-Q-7 flop. Sekularac check-raised a 13,600 bet from Fernandez to 27,500, but Fernandez wouldn’t back down, firing off a four bet. At this time, Sekularac quit playing around and moved all in, bringing an immediate fold from Fernandez. After the pot was pushed to Sekularac, he sat on 270K in chips while Fernandez dropped to 120K.
Sekularac would remain around the top of the leaderboard – although he cut some chips out for Vandersmissen – as the tournament went to the dinner break. After they came back from that break, Lauri Pesonen and Leo Margets would depart, but it was a battle between Benjamin Pollak and Morten Mortensen that would stun those in attendance.
After Sekularac started up the action, Pollak and Mortensen both called to see a 6-4-4 flop. Pollak opened up out of the small blind for 4100 and Mortensen called, but Sekularac didn’t believe them; he would up the betting to 15K and Pollak made the call. Mortensen now came to life, pushing it to 33K and forcing Sekularac into a fold. Pollak, surprising many around the table, made the call.
On the turn trey, Pollak made a smallish bet of 14K and, in another surprising move (after his flop aggression), Mortensen only made the call. A five on the turn brought what appeared to be a shutdown from Pollak in the form of a check and Mortensen sprung, moving all in. Pollak immediately made the call and, after seeing Mortensen table pocket sixes for the flopped boat, quietly turned up his pocket fours for flopped quads to eliminate Mortensen and move Pollak into the lead.
It would not be a lead that Pollak would hold long, however. Hassani would power his way to the lead after eliminating Andreas Berggren, but it would be Anaras Alekberovas who would end the day on the top of the leaderboard. Taking on Yigit Aktulga pocket Aces, Alekberovas was able to hit with his pocket treys on the flop and the river to eliminate Aktulga and take the overall lead heading to Day Three on Monday.
1. Anaras Alekberovas, 467,000
2. Tahiri Hassani, 434,500
3. Antonio Alfaia, 430,500
4. Alvaro Ballesteros, 351,500
5. Lukas Berglund, 347,000
6. Henri Benoni, 318,000
7. Atanas Gueorgulev, 255,500
8. Jari Mahonen, 227,500
9. Kevin Vandersmissen, 226,700
10. Carmelo Placenti, 217,500
Pollak is lurking in eleventh place (212,500), while Bevand (178,500), Testud, (140,000), Bryn Kenney (123,500), O’Dwyer (112,000) and Paez (109,000) all have their work cut out for them if they are to make an impact on this tournament.
42 players will come back to the tables in Barcelona this afternoon, with the first order of business to figure out who will get paid. The Top 27 finishers will take home a minimum $8,658, with the champion of the tournament earning a $258,488 payday, a seat at the WPT Championship next month and their name on the WPT Champions’ Cup.
