German Poker Championship €2,200 Main Event champion Arsenii Karmatckii was spotted all in and at risk for 604,000 on a flop of when facing a bet of his table neighbor for 310,000 with a pot of 320,000. Karmatckii was called and turned over while the opponent had the . The turn and river changed nothing whatsoever and the Russian doubled.
The player in the cutoff raised to 35,000 and was called by Joao Simao on the button and the player in the big blind.
The flop came , both the big blind and cutoff checked. Simao bet 45,000, the big blind folded but the cutoff raised to 105,000. Simao called.
They both checked through the on the turn to the on the river. The cutoff bet 65,000 and after some careful consideration, Simao called. His opponent showed for two pair, kings and sevens, and that was enough for Simao to muck his hand.
Eusebiu Jalba was spotted talking to a player in the satellite and was kind enough to tell us how he was eliminated from the tournament:
"It happened in the 7,000/14,000 level, I had in the cutoff with 700,000 behind. The player in the under-the-gun position raised to 30,000, I three-bet to 80,000, he called. The flop was with two spades and a diamond. He checked, I bet 60,000, he raised to 300,000 and I shoved. He called. A king came on the turn and then the queen on the river. He had . Sick... But I'll reenter now."
After building a big stack early on with aces versus kings, Dermot Blain was just on the other side of this very setup to crash out in level five while Dzmitry Urbanovich also busted an opponent with a "sick call" according to Kai Münster to have an impressive start into Day 1a.
Blain raised to 50,000 and Blom three-bet to 150,000 in the small blind. Blain then made it 275,000 only for Blom to click it up to 725,000. It took just a few moments until Blain announced all in for more than 2.2 million, and Blom confirmed the all in with the dealer before snap-calling with the slightly superior stack.
Dermot Blain:
Viktor Blom:
The flop crushed all hopes of a possible upset, and Blain was left drawing dead on the turn to make the river a mere formality.
The flop on the board read and there was about 100,000 in the middle. The player in the big blind checked. Steffen Sontheimer, in the under-the-gun position, bet 55,000 and both the players on the button and the big blind called.
The board was completed with the on the river. The big blind checked again. Sontheimer now shoved for about 140,000 and both of his opponents folded immediately.
"I busted Vlad Darie, but I am just not really running well," Martin Weiemann mentioned and his stack indeed only showed about one third of what he started with on the second bullet. According to Weiemann, Darie three-bet all in with out of the small blind for 30 big blinds and Weiemann on the button called with .
Soon after that, though, Niall Farrell got there with to crack the pocket queens of Weiemann after picking up an open-ended straight draw on the flop.
The tournament is well on track to meet the massive guarantee of €5,000,000 as Day 1a of the €5,300 Main Event has already attracted a field of 201 entries, of which 176 remain. Several of the pros already fired the optional single re-entry to get another shot at glory. Among those was Martin Finger, who was seated right next to fellow German Julian Thomas.