2012 PokerStars.net APPT Macau: Asia Championship of Poker Day 4: Kanaan Leads
After seven hours of poker action the final table of the 2012 PokerStars.net APPT Asia Championship of Poker was set and Michael Kanaan will lead the final nine with a chip stack of 1,393,000. The finalists will return on Sunday in Macau to play for the HKD$4,240,000 (USD$547,000) first-place prize.
The day began with 22 players. James McCarty was the first player eliminated when he was knocked out by Alan Sass. Play picked up near the end of the first level after both Andrew Hinrichsen and Tom Alrner managed to double through Raiden Kan. After Seungsoo Jeon was sent to the rail in 21st place, Yuri Ishida got her chips in with ace-jack, but fell to Ying Kit Chan's pocket kings.
Raiden Kan, who started the day fourth in chips, was knocked out in 19th bringing the field to 18. After the short stacks lingered around for a while, Zhongwei Wang got very unlucky. Wang's chips went in with top pair and a flush draw against Andrew Hinrichsen's inferior pair, but Hinrichsen hit trips on the turn and eliminatned Wang in 18th place.
The two remaining tables were getting short handed and Aaron Lim and Paolo Gompagno, who were both sitting with short stacks, were next to go. After losing a lot of chips to Ying Kit Chan early in the day, Day 1 chip leader Gary Lam was eliminated in 15th place. Lam ran ten-nine suited into Henry Wang's ace-jack and took home HKD$259,500 for his efforts. Then, Ping Lin, who began the day as one of the short stacks, busted in 14th place.
One of the most important pots of the tournament was the one between Michael Kanaan and Mike Watson. Both players were among the biggest stacks in the room for most of the day, and they ultimately clashed when Watson ran kings into Kanaan's aces.
Kanaan grabbed a huge chip lead which he kept heading into the final table. Team PokerStars Pro Raymond Wu busted in 13th place when his queen-eight didn't improve against Xing Zhou's jacks. Watson was knocked down short by Kanaan and was then eliminated in 12th place.
The final table bubble started when Tri Huynh lost his chips to Zhou in an unfortunate turn of events. On an 8x5x3x flop, Zhou flopped two pair with 5x3x. Zhou called Huynh's raise from the big blind and took all Huynh's chips when his queens failed to improve. With just 10 players left a few short stacks doubled up, but eventually Andrew Gaw was eliminated in 10th place.
2012 PokerStars.net APPT ACOP Final Table
| Seat | Player | Country | Chip Count |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Jacques Zaicik | France | 191,000 |
| 2 | Michael Kanaan | Australia | 1,393,000 |
| 3 | Tsugunari Toma | Japan | 788,500 |
| 4 | Ying Kit Chan | Hong Kong | 348,000 |
| 5 | Henry Hung Tu Wang | Chinese Taipei | 429,000 |
| 6 | Andrew Hinrichsen | Australia | 798,500 |
| 7 | Tom Alner | UK | 826,500 |
| 8 | Alan Sass | USA | 252,000 |
| 9 | Xing Zhou | China | 493,000 |
The PokerNews Team will be on hand for all of the action from the final table, beginning Sunday 1400 CST (2300 PDT, Saturday), so keep it locked on the Live Reporting Blog and as always, follow PokerNews on Twitter for up-to-the-minute news.
