Another day is upon us at the 2019 partypoker LIVE MILLIONS Europe in Rozvadov, Czech Republic, and it is time for Day 1b of the €10,300 Main Event in the King's Resort. The tournament features a €5,000,000 prize pool which is the biggest on the entire schedule.
Yesterday saw 101 players survive out of 165 that gave it a shot. They played eight one-hour levels with a fifteen-minute break after every two levels. Mikhail Vilkov ended at the top of the leaderboard with 4,850,000 but he is closely followed by none other than Dietrich Fast who bagged 4,255,000.
Today will feature the second and final starting day but that doesn't mean that registration will be closed at the end of the day. The late registration period is still open until the end of the second level of Day 2. Players will receive a new starting stack of 1,000,000 and the first level of Day 2 is 15,000/30,000. The plan is to play down to the money on Day 2 so the online qualifiers, who already made it into the money, can join on Day 3.
The field is expected to be bigger than yesterday and plenty of new faces were already seen walking around in Rozvadov. They still need plenty more entrants to reach that beautiful guaranteed prize pool of €5,000,000.
PokerGO will be streaming Day 1b of the tournament from 3:15 p.m. local time.
Keep an eye on PokerNews for the live coverage throughout the tournament.
Josip Simunic is also one of the players that is on his second bullet. He saw Ryan Rivers open from the cutoff to 15,000 and he called from the button. Big blind Jonas Lauck, on his second bullet as well, defended his big blind.
The flop was dealt and it checked to Simunic. The Austrian partypoker Pro took over the betting initiative after he bet 20,000. Rivers was the only player that stuck around. Rivers check-folded on the after Simunic bet 36,000.
Blaz Zerjav also belongs to one of the early players to be eliminated on Day 1b. Zerjav was seen entering the €330 Turbo Bounty tournament that is running on the side and it was confirmed that he indeed busted out of the Main Event.
Zerjav made a name for himself after he turned a $5 investment into more than $1.3 million on during the 2018 partypoker MILLIONS Online.
He does have another shot at partypoker MILLIONS glory if he chooses to reenter on Day 2.
The live stream of the €10,300 Main Event is live on PokerGO. The feature table will be on a delay with commentary provided by [Removed:139] and Jamie Kerstetter.
Make sure to tune in to see cards-up coverage of the €5,000,000 guaranteed Main Event live from the King's Resort in Rozvadov, Czech Republic.
There will also be a tab at the top of this page with the live stream.
Pavel Plesuv saw the player next to him in the cutoff open to 35,000 and he called from the button. Michael Chi Zhang put 178,000 in the middle with just 1,000 behind and it folded back to Plesuv. He put the extra 1,000 in as well and Zhang called and they opened up.
Michael Chi Zhang:
Pavel Plesuv:
The board ran out and Zhang secured a much needed double up.
With on the board, Charle Carrel bet 200,000 from the hijack, into Ben Heath on the button. Heath took some time to think about making the call, with his own stack dwindling.
Three time bank chips later, Heath made the call, and saw that his was good against Carrel's . The gutsy ace-high call keeps Heath in the hunt as the last level of Day 1b approaches.
Day 1b is complete in the 2019 partypoker LIVE MILLIONS Europe Main Event, and with the chips in the bags it’s Freddy Deeb who holds the chip lead going into Day 2. Deeb ended the night with 5,875,000 chips, which is the largest overall stack from either of the Day 1 flights.
Other large stacks from Day 1b include Piet Pape (5,585,000) and Yake Wu (5,500,000), and the trio of Deeb, Pape and Wu finished at a large distance ahead of the rest of the Day 1b field. Like Day 1a, the Day 1b field played through eight 60-minute levels in the €10,300 buy-in event after beginning the day at noon local time.
Those three players will be the top three stacks when Day 2 commences. The 59 players that survived Day 1b will join the 101 players that bagged Day 1a, and the combined field of 160 will return to the King’s Resort in Rozvadov, Czech Republic Friday for Day 2 as the action continues in this €5,000,000 guaranteed tournament.
Deeb, Wu Bag Big
Poker legend Freddy Deeb has been no stranger to success at partypoker LIVE MILLIONS events in 2019.
Deeb’s largest cash in the last four years came earlier this year, when he finished fourth in the Main Event of the partypoker LIVE MILLIONS Vegas event and took home $319,200. Deeb appeared in the field early in the day and rode a wave of big pots to the overall chip lead. He’ll be looking to add to his legend, and his total tournament career tournaments earnings total , which coming into this tournament is $8,945,355.
Deeb is joined at the top of the chip leaderboard by the German Pape, and China’s Wu. Wu is coming off a second-place finish in the €25,000 Triton Short Deck event earlier at the partypoker LIVE MILLIONS Europe, and is in good position to add to an already successful trip to Rozvadov with a possible deep run in the Main Event.
Loaded Field
A table full of crushers developed right at the start of Thursday’s flight, as Ben Heath, Charlie Carrel, and partypoker pro Josip Simunic were all seated together. That lineup was moved to the televised feature table for much of day. Hossein Ensan, the 2019 World Series of Poker Main Event champion, joined the group later in the day at what was certainly one of the toughest draws in the room.
Other interesting dynamics unfolded at other tables, including a pair of WSOP Main Event champions seated next to each other in Ryan Riess and 2018 WSOP Europe Champion Jack Sinclair. Yet another table put partypoker pro Jeff Gross at the same table as German pros Ole Schemion and Steffan Sontheimer, and that group was moved to the feature table for the second half of the day.
A slew of other big names came through the King’s Casino poker arena for Day 1b. Some of the players not making through the day included Sontheimer, Mustapha Kanit, Michael Chi Zhang and Kristen Bicknell. All of those players busted Day 1b, but all still have the opportunity to re-enter the event through the first two levels of Day 2.
Some of the players that did make it through to Day 2 include partypoker pros like Bertand Grospellier (835,000) and Josep Simunic (675,000).
Other notables making it through included Carrel (2,975,000), Kenny Hallaert (2,930,000), Maria Lampropulos (1,855,000), Kahle Burns (1,655,000) Orpen Kisacikoglu (1,615,000) and Sinclair (1,410,000). Heath (1,140,000), Ensan (920,000) and Schemion (480,000) also all made it to the end of the night with chips in the bag.
Day 2 restarts at noon local time Friday, and play starts at Level 9 with the blinds at 15000/30000. Players will keep working through 60-minute levels, with late registration available up until the beginning of Level 11.
Keep it right here with the PokerNews live reporting team as the partypoker LIVE MILLIONS Europe Main Event continues.
Follow the action from partypoker LIVE MILLIONS Europe on live stream with PokerGO.